


Red Threads, Widow's Webs

by Meskeet, Red_Tigress



Series: 2015 Year of Tuesday Fic [5]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Espionage, Gen, Natasha and Clint Are Spy Bros, POV Female Character, Politics, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Pre-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Slow Build, Stakeouts, The B Plot of This Fic Is Clint's Food Of The Day, Women Being Awesome, spy bros
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-12
Updated: 2015-03-18
Packaged: 2018-03-17 12:19:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 26,858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3529145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meskeet/pseuds/Meskeet, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Red_Tigress/pseuds/Red_Tigress
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Tony Stark is unexpectedly nominated as Secretary of Defense, Natasha doesn't think things are as simple as they seem. With Steve missing and Clint in tow, she untangles a web that runs much deeper than any of them ever guessed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BloodFromTheThorn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BloodFromTheThorn/gifts).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was meant to be a quick round robin. Instead it's an 80 page espionage and political thriller. Gotta say, it's the last time I let Red pick the prompt. This here is the reason why I missed two weeks in a row on my 'post a fic every Tuesday' resolution.
> 
> This fic is complete, and updates will be as often as possible as edits get done. Expect updates pretty much everyday (more, if I let Red run away with it). As Red said on ff.net, we're pretty proud of how this fic turned out and we hope you enjoy reading as much as we did writing it!
> 
> Main character is Natasha Romanov. Supporting cast includes Clint Barton, Tony Stark, Steve Rogers, and Clint's snacks.  
> -V

Originally, the mission wasn’t supposed to be complicated.

Complicated by her standards, that was. Considering some of Natasha’s allies were a Norse god, a man in his nineties in better shape than most twenty-somethings, someone who turned into a giant green monster when he got a little emotional, a former carnie turned assassin, and someone who had modernized a suit of armor… out of the ordinary _"complicated"_ didn’t happen much anymore. She was a Russian assassin, after all, and being Russian meant nothing could phase her.

Except when it did, normally to quite disastrous results. Not always for her, but for the greater public at large at the very least.

In her defense, it started out pretty innocently. As things were wont to do, a simple mission to eradicate a cell went south as soon as Stark got involved.

It began when, sitting in Dulles International, a reporter on a flat screen suspended on the wall mentioned the words “Tony Stark”. Natasha glanced up absentmindedly in response. While hearing the name “Tony Stark” on CNN twenty times a day wasn’t really unusual in itself, the graphic of the White House immediately caught her attention.

Natasha narrowed her eyes and glanced around at the other waiting passengers. Most weren’t paying attention to the screens that ran 24-hour news networks at Dulles, but a few were watching with far less interest than herself. The headline read _“Iron Man Appointed to Cabinet?”_

She couldn’t stop the look of surprise that crossed her face as she followed along the slightly delayed subtitles.

_Sources close to the administration say President Ellis is considering appointing none other than Avenger Tony Stark as Secretary of Defense. The previous Secretary resigned last week for health reasons. Although Stark has made comments in the past about his interest in receiving such a nomination, until now it was believed his words shouldn’t be taken seriously._

Natasha glanced at her phone. No messages yet. It irked her she was only hearing about this development now - and from CNN, no less. She bit the inside of her cheek as she drummed her fingers on her knees. She was supposed to be flying to Munich to meet Steve. He had agreed to help her tie-up loose ends of the Red Room, mostly ex-KGB agents with just enough knowledge to start a dangerous off-shoot program somewhere else. But this…

Maybe this was nothing. Maybe it was just politicians blowing smoke, and the press had latched onto the idea of the star-studded celebrity in the cabinet thing. Maybe there wasn’t an ounce of truth to it. Except… maybe there was.

She sent off a message to Steve, whom she knew was still in New York and waiting for his own plane, hoping that maybe Stark had mentioned something to him.

_Did you hear about this Stark thing?_

She looked up again as some people on CNN began to talk over a desk, a picture of Tony in the lower left hand corner. The airport’s bustle made it impossible to decipher what the reporters were saying, and Natasha chewed on her lip absentmindedly and wished for subtitles.

Her phone buzzed - Steve.

_What Stark thing?_

_Someone’s talking about nominating him for Secretary of Defense._

She looked back up, wincing when CNN showed footage of Tony’s old Malibu home crashing into the ocean. The subtitle read _Do we really want a Secretary of Defense that insights terrorist violence instead of squashing it?_

She raised an eyebrow. They weren’t completely wrong there. Natasha glanced back down to see a new message from Steve.

_This is ridiculous. Is this for real?_

_It could be nothing. But...do you want me to stay here? Check it out?_

It was about half a minute before the reply came back.

_There’s nothing to check out._

So that was it, then. Natasha stared at her phone, distantly registering the first class boarding call for her flight as she opened a new text message.

_Aren’t you a little too busy being Iron Man to be in the President’s Cabinet?_

She stood up, tapping her finger against her phone again. Natasha made her way to the gate, passing her boarding pass along to the waiting attendant. As she boarded the plane with her group, Natasha kept glancing at her phone every few seconds.

The curveball Tony had thrown at them - not even the first time he’s done this, Romanov - was enough to make her reconsider accompanying Steve on the mission. The Red Room in Munich was supposed to be a fairly new development, one too shabby to stay under the radar as it tried to build itself up. Likely some fallen officer trying to make a name for his or herself, was her assumption. Still, she didn’t want to leave Steve without backup on this one.

Still, she hesitated even as she heard the plane’s engines start up, glancing down at her phone once again. No new texts.

“Ma’am, you’re going to need to put that on airplane mode now,” one of the flight attendants smiled at her.

She sighed, turning it off. Stark’s brewing fiasco would keep - Natasha had made Steve a promise, and better to cull a small Red Room than a large one that had been left to fester. She watched her phone switch off, grimacing.

She’d reevaluate in Munich. 

* * *

Steve’s plane was due to arrive six hours after Natasha’s landed, so she found herself with time to kill in the hotel room that had been waiting for them. She’d almost depleted her phone battery on the plane, so it wasn’t until she slipped into her room and laid her bags down that she began to scroll through her messages.

From Clint: _is this 4 rl?_

From Banner: _Tony isn’t replying. Do you know what’s going on?_

From Steve: _Potts said she’d be in touch after SI made official release. Seems legitimate._

There were a few other miscellaneous messages from contacts in Munich that would wait until Steve arrived, but for now she’d focus just on the most pressing issue; that was to say, what the _hell_ Stark was thinking.

She checked the clock and calculated. It would be roughly 8 at night on the East Coast - probably the best time to catch him, before he got caught up in some new invention that would keep him occupied for the night. Maybe she could just call and get a straight answer out of him. It had been known to happen on occasion. Rarely, but still.

Natasha pressed dial before she could begin to second-guess herself, reaching for the remote and turning the TV on with her free hand. It was set to some German soap opera, and she turned up the volume to make sure no one listening outside could overhear her. She’d done a quick sweep for bugs, and that short security check in combination with keeping her voice low would probably provide enough cover for a few quick calls. They were here on a mission, after all, and she didn’t want their connection to the Avengers to send the Red Room underground before they could launch their attack.

 _“Good evening, Agent Romanov. What service may I provide tonight?”_ To her surprise, rather than make her listen to an endlessly ringing phone, Jarvis answered the call. Maybe Tony was actually willing to chat.

“Is Tony available?” Natasha asked cordially.

There was a long pause, hopefully as Jarvis requested for Tony to pick up the goddamn telephone. Then: _“Mr. Stark is currently not accepting phone calls at this time.”_ The phrasing made her raise an eyebrow, and Natasha sat back in her chair as Jarvis continued. _“Would you like me to pass on a message?”_

Interesting. She resisted the urge to grind her teeth together and inform Jarvis what exactly he could let Tony know. “Is Pepper available?”

 _“Ms. Potts is currently in a meeting,”_ came the immediate reply. _“Would you like to leave a message for her?”_

So Tony was probably listening to Jarvis stonewall her, and Pepper was probably handling the political fiasco. Definitely interesting - and not what Natasha would define as a good interesting.

 _“Agent Romanov?”_ asked Jarvis when the silence ran too long.

“Please inform Mr. Stark that I’d like to speak with him,” Natasha said at last, words a bit more clipped than she intended. “At his earliest convenience.” _As usual. If he doesn’t make time, I’ll make it for him._

_“As you wish, Agent Romanov. Is that all?”_

Natasha considered. “I’ll be returning stateside in a few days - will you schedule me a lunch date with Pepper? As soon as possible.”

_“It will be my pleasure, Agent Romanov.”_

Natasha nodded to herself. “Thanks, Jarvis.”

After wishing him a good day (could an AI have a good day?), Natasha hung up her phone and idly turned it over in her hands. Stark was dodging phone calls and Pepper seemed to be bouncing from one meeting to another. Never a good sign, as far as national security was concerned. At least he’d had Jarvis pick up the phone, rather than let her call multiple times.

Still, it was… odd behavior. Although Stark prided himself on being fairly unpredictable, Natasha generally had a good grasp of what curveballs he’d try to throw at them next. This, though, was something even she hadn’t thought possible. Even if he had managed to save the president’s life, Stark had never had anything but trouble from the government. She’d sees the newsreel of the one joking comment he’d made at his hearing, but it was obvious he hadn’t meant anything by it or expected them to take him seriously.

If he had, that meant Natasha had misjudged him horribly, which was simply something Natasha didn’t do.

“Damn it,” Natasha muttered. She reached over to her backpack and slid out her laptop. It wasn’t SI make, which hopefully would provide a little extra insurance and security in case Tony made a break from the Avengers. She’d registered it under a different name, never logged into an account she’d logged into on SI networks, and had loaded it up with software designed to destroy the entire thing if anyone tried to get in.

Natasha tilted her chair back to grab the remote again and switched from the soap opera to an actual news station, turning the volume down to a quieter level.  She let the German wash over her as her laptop scanned for her identity. She’d given Stark the time period she’d promised - even if the promise was only made to herself. As much as she hated to have to resort to cornering him, Natasha opened her browser and began to look for tickets.

She needed answers, which meant as soon as they were done here, it was time to go back to America. She’d talk to Pepper first, and if that failed, would dog Stark soon after.

* * *

 Steve got in later that night and instantly fell asleep in the other bed. They’d already done their pre-planning for the small Red Room outside of Munich that they’d planned to hit. It hadn’t been difficult to plan, but their main issue was remaining under the radar. Natasha and Steve would go after the organization the next night, before word of their presence in the city had chance to spread around. They could both keep a low-profile, but Natasha would rather not risk it.

Which is how almost exactly twenty-four hours later, Natasha found herself following Steve into a decrepit, moldy building.

Two guards immediately appeared, but Steve brought them down with a shield ricochet before they could even process Captain America was in the building. Natasha surged ahead, leaping onto a third man who had just come into the main hallway. He pulled his gun on her, but she smashed his wrist against the wall to make him drop it. Quickly, Natasha stabbed him in the side and leapt away from his falling body.

She paused, taking stock of her surroundings.

Behind her, Steve was breathing heavily - apparently, even super soldiers were exhausted by kicking down door after door. There was a staircase in front of her, and distantly she heard the sounds of screaming. Steve heard it too. “I’ll follow your lead,” he told her.

She nodded, bolting down the stairs. Two stories down, they were stopped by a pair of thick lab doors. She took stock through the windows, noting at least three guards and two technicians. Natasha pressed herself against the wall at the sound of screaming - a quick glance revealed someone strapped to a lab table, thrashing against their bounds.

Five guards in her line of sight. She signaled quickly to Steve, and he nodded. Shield in hand, he moved past her and kicked open what was hopefully the last set of doors. Natasha took the opportunity to catch her breath, only entering after she heard the satisfying thunk of his shield.

She entered, sweeping the area quickly. Two guards were on the ground, and Natasha shot another guard while Steve took out a third. One technician had backed up against the wall, her hands raised in a gesture of surrender. The other one reached down to grab a fallen guard’s gun, and Natasha shot her before she could get up again. Steve immediately went over to the man strapped to the table, saying reassuring things in German to him.

Natasha kept her gun trained on the tech who’d surrendered.

 _“What are you doing here?”_ she asked in German.

_“Please, they said they’d kill my family if I didn’t help. I was coerced!”_

Natasha flicked her head towards Steve and the other man. “ _What were you doing to him?”_

The tech turned around and opened a box that was on the counter. Natasha tensed, wary of weapons and bombs, but when the woman turned back around there was only a small medical bottle in her hands. She held it out to Natasha without saying a thing.

Natasha took it and read the label while the tech kept talking. B46_M18. She turned the bottle over, looking for anything else. The handwritten label and numbers were the only things on it. Not much in the way of clues.

 _“What does it do?”_ Natasha asked impatiently.

_“I don’t know. Please, all my contact was anonymous, I just want to go home. I don’t know what it does, I was just supposed to administer it and sedatives. I’m an anesthesiologist!”_

Natasha holstered her gun and put one hand up placatingly. _“We’re going to have to drop you off at the police, tell them your story.”_ She replaced the bottle back in the box. She’d send it off to a lab in the States. Anything manufactured by the Red Room was sure to be nasty. _“But say these were destroyed in the fight and you don’t know what it was. Alright?”_

The other woman gave a shaky nod.

After they’d destroyed the box, keeping one vial for tests, and dropped off the victims, they returned to the hotel. As they entered, Natasha’s phone dinged in her pocket.

“What’s that?” Steve asked curiously.

“My pre-flight check in,” she grinned.


	2. Chapter 2

Needless to say, Steve wasn’t originally very happy with her. After she explained her leads had all grown cold and she had things to do stateside anyway, he grew a bit more accepting. It was obvious both of them were worried about the nomination, even if Steve did seem more irritated than her about it.

They sat together inside a cafe near their hotel the morning of her flight back, sipping coffee that was too weak.

Steve leaned forward over the table between them, peering out from under his baseball cap with worried eyes. “Is it Stark?”

“Yes,” she didn’t lie. They’d been through too much together for that. “It’s looking like the nomination is going to happen. Even if Ellis hadn’t actually been considering it before, all the limelight from the political angle has brought it to his attention.”

Steve grimaced and leaned back in his chair, clamping his fingers on the table edge. More than anything else, he looked resigned.  “We have no business being in politics.”

“I know. That’s why I want to talk to him.”

“Nothing you say is going to change his mind,” Steve insisted, keeping his voice low. “You have to talk to the President.”

She raised an eyebrow in reply. “Seems to me like Captain America is better equipped to talk to the President than I am.”

Steve shrugged. “Maybe I will. I’m not afraid to tell him it’s a stupid decision, no matter if Stark wants it or not. But I think I can still do some good here. I’m surprised you’re not staying.”

Natasha looked away, sighing. “If I have to, I will. There’s not much clean up to do, or I’d stay. But… something’s just not sitting right with me now.” She brushed her thumb over her coffee mug. “I’ll let you know if something changes, okay? And you’ll do the same?”

He gave her an easy smile that Natasha was able to return. “Of course. Have a good trip.”

 

* * *

She arrived in New York late the next day and headed for an old safe house she shared with Clint. It was a dingy apartment, but fully paid for and kept under the SHIELD radar in case something happened. Now that something _had_ happened, they both just treated it like a normal apartment.

Unfortunately, in Clint’s case, that meant leaving stale boxes of Cap’n Crunch open on the coffee table and bananas in the fruit bowl long enough to attract flies. After digging into the freezer, Natasha found a frozen meal to heat up as she checked her messages. She had her own space at Stark Tower of course, but she had a feeling Tony wanted the distance, and Natasha wanted to keep herself as objective as possible.

Going through her messages, she rolled her eyes as she found one from Clint apologizing for the state of the apartment and then saying he thought he left a sandwich on the nightstand in addition to the treasures she’d already found. She also found a message from Bruce, saying he was doing some humanitarian efforts in a smaller town outside of Rio and would probably be out of contact for a few days. He’d added that she should let him know if anything developed, since Tony still wasn’t answering messages from him.

She considered how long it had taken Bruce to get to a place where letting them know where he was, much less his schedule, was a huge accomplishment. This was something that Tony was also fully aware of. It could have been he was just busy, but...Bruce probably wouldn’t be telling her unless he was concerned. If he’d told her that much, she could probably count on his support.

She was just laying down to go to sleep (on a bed Clint hadn’t bothered to make) when her phone lit up with a message. It was from Jarvis, confirming a lunch date with Pepper tomorrow at a nice little bistro in the Village. She thanked him and replied she’d be there.

 

* * *

The next day Natasha got up early, went for a short grocery run, and sent Clint a quick message asking for him to call her. Soon after, she took a cab to the Village and arrived just a few minutes early. She strode into the bistro quickly, eyes sweeping the scene by reflex. After confirming no one looked like they were watching the door, Natasha went to where she saw Pepper just settling into her seat.

Natasha smiled at Happy, at Potts’ shoulder. Her grin only broadened when he took a quick step back.

“Thank you for waiting, Happy. I’ll be fine from here,” Pepper said as she rose with a smile and extended a hand to Natasha. “Agent Romanov, thank you for coming.”

Natasha took it, correcting her quietly and hoping Pepper would get the hint, “Just Natasha, for today.”

“Natasha, then,” Pepper ceded immediately with a slight nod. Good, they both knew she wasn’t here in any official capacity and the idea was enough for Pepper to let her guard down ever so slightly as they settled into their seats. “How have you been?”

“Worried,” Natasha said frankly. Pepper’s smile faltered slightly, then reappeared with a bit of a strained not. “None of us have any idea what’s going on, and Tony won’t answer any attempts to contact him. All I’ve been getting from his end is Jarvis.”

Pepper sipped at her water, and Natasha chose not to call her on the delaying tactic. Likely, she’d get better information if she gave the other woman a chance to collect her thoughts before speaking.

“I’ve been fielding SI board members the past few days,” Pepper said at last.

Natasha didn’t speak at first, hoping Pepper would continue of her own volition. When she didn’t, she sighed audibly. “Is he avoiding you as well?”

Pepper had been working with Tony for too long - she didn’t react to the statement, unwilling to let Natasha see any chinks in her armor. Still, Natasha was more than aware they were there. It was just a matter of finding them and ferreting them out to get the information she wanted.

“Tony’s been busy with the President. We didn’t receive much advance notice of the nomination, unfortunately. It’s all been very sudden and it’s a very big honor.”

Sure it was. “I recognize a company line when I hear one,” Natasha said, calling Pepper on the bluff.

Pepper’s eyes narrowed just slightly, the closed off expression enough to make Natasha miss the days when they’d been Natalie Rushman and Miss Potts, both still adapting to running a corporation.  “Agent-”

“I said to call me Natasha,” she snapped, then immediately softened her tone. “Pepper, I just want to know what’s going on. Steve’s in Europe, Bruce’s in Rio, Thor’s been out of contact for months and Clint’s off… doing whatever he does when he’s not being an Avenger. I’m worried. We’re a team, but no one’s acting like it anymore - and something like this? None of us know what we’re supposed to do.”

Something hit the right note in Pepper. Immediately, the woman relaxed and reached for her water again. Natasha was aware that there were photographers lurking outside for them both, and it was probably that fact that stopped Pepper from burying her head in her hands. “I’m worried too, Nat. This isn’t like Tony at all. But while the Mandarin made him better, in some ways, it’s also changed him. More than Loki did, in a lot of ways.”

Natasha’s mouth twisted. “We’ve all changed a lot, since Loki.”

“Not like this,” Pepper said, and it had obviously been weighing down on her for a while now. “The Senate’s been pushing for him, and the movement’s led by some Congressman from Ohio. His background checks out, but the whole thing’s been moving so fast, I haven’t been able to do any follow up.”

There. That was a lead she could follow. Natasha tilted her head slightly, considering Pepper. “When did you last speak to Tony?” she asked.

“Last week,” Pepper said. Natasha blinked. “I spoke to him a few hours before Secretary Hager resigned - I got a notification from Jarvis when he did, and already we’d been told by the Senate Armed Services Committee to standby for news.”

“And he didn’t mention anything then?”

“No, he’d just said he had a meeting about some new tech funding.”

There were pieces here, but Natasha couldn’t yet patch them together. She grimaced at Pepper as their food arrived. “Do you think he’ll meet with me if I go through Jarvis?”

Pepper shook her head as she picked up her spoon. “I don’t think he’s been back to the Tower in a few days.”

Natasha cursed quietly, ignoring Pepper’s censuring look. It looked as though she’d need to do some investigative work on her own time, then. “Which Congressmen did you say proposed Tony for Secretary?”

 

* * *

Pepper had to leave for other meetings after they finished their small meal. Natasha thanked her, hugged her, and told her if she needed anything at all to call her right away. Pepper had only nodded tiredly, before plastering her CEO face on and leaving the restaurant.

Natasha slipped out the back door and returned to her apartment.

She started off with a simple Google search for Congressman Vance. He was currently serving his fifth term, and seemed just to be a few years older than Tony. He had a few ties to members of the Senate’s Armed Forces Committee, despite not being in the Senate himself.  Nothing much stood out to her on his wikipedia page, and she didn’t see anything that could connect him with Stark Industries or Tony himself. He did have a seat on the Congressional Intelligence Committee, but she didn’t think that would have connected him to Stark.

No public scandals. No school connections. No military funding connections. She doubted even if Stark was working on some top secret project for the FBI, this guy would think he could get away without getting slapped with a conflict of interest.

Time to dig, then.

Her familiarity with the Deep Web was a passing one, but it was enough that she could grasp the startings of threads of truth that often unraveled into something more.

With government officials, people were sometimes reluctant to come out of the woodwork, but they were often standing in the shadows, watching and waiting for someone to take that first step. She found a page detailing reports of illicit sexual encounters, but that was nothing new. Vance barely noted a mention in that one, and it was nothing concrete. She dug a little deeper, finding reports of dealing under the table, and taking money from lobbyists to advance an agenda. Again, nothing new, but Vance wasn’t on any of these lists.

She leaned back in her chair, tapping the desktop thoughtfully. Time to get weird.

The next page she found had some more far-reaching allegations. Everything from aliens to immortality to how many spies Russia had in the Pentagon (that one made her laugh). She continued scrolling, about to give up, when something caught her eye.

_I first saw mentions of Hydra in the government here, and that turned out to be true, so anyway, here goes. I work for a group that develops biological weapons, and I could not only be fired, but persecuted for saying any of this. There are members of Congress working with company to develop weapons that aren’t on any reports. I have the highest clearance in my company, and I don’t know where these things are going, who’s developing them, or scariest of all, what they even are. I’m seriously worried for the future state of warfare, because this goes far beyond corporate espionage._

Natasha leaned forward. There was a distinct possibility this person was crazy, and a more distinct possibility that it wasn’t connected in any way. Still, it seemed to be worth pursuing and it was better to waste some time on false leads than kick herself for missing something just for expediency’s sake.

_Do you have names?_ She asked.

She knew she wouldn’t get an answer right away, so she logged.

In the meantime, it was time to figure out where Tony Stark was hiding.

 

* * *

To his credit, Stark did an impressive job of covering his tracks. Of course, the more he tried to hide the more suspicious his actions seemed to be. Still, ‘an impressive job of hiding’ didn’t necessarily translate to ‘a successful job of hiding from Natasha Romanov’.

_Busy tonight?_ she texted Clint as she idly waited for her bus.

_y, wz up?_ came the almost immediate reply. _Shame on you, Barton. You must be bored_ , she thought with some amusement.

_Need backup for playboy tonight_ , she sent back, and waited.

To her surprise, Clint took fifteen rather than ten seconds to call her after that last text. Either he’d been distracted or had spent more time gaping at her text than she’d expected.

_“What the hell, Nat?”_

“This is an insecure line and I need to find out where he’s been hiding,” she said without preamble. “You in?”

_“I’m b-”_

“ _Clint_ , I threw away your moldy sandwich.”

_“One second,"_  he grumbled at her. Natasha winced at the sound of a sharp whistle over the phone - there was a quick exchange of voices, one female and the other obviously Clint before he returned to the phone. _“Okay, fine. Where do you need me to be?”_

“DC,” Natasha said, piecing things together on the fly. As far as she knew, Tony had always based himself out of Malibu and New York. If he was starting to get involved in politics, he probably would have bought himself something as inconspicuous as Stark could stomach close to the capital.

Clint made a noise of faint disgust. _“I hate DC.”_

“I know you do,” Natasha said sweetly. “When can you get there?”

_“Couple of hours, I guess. I need to make sure things here are fine before I go. I’ll be there by ten.”_

“I owe you,” she said. “I’m going to burner phones so we can’t be tracked. Do you still have my number from Florida?”

_“Mhm. I’ll call you on there. Just make me some borscht and we’re even,”_ he said hopefully. Natasha was still laughing as they hung up.

It would probably be easier to drive than fly - as long as she took a car without GPS, it would be more difficult to track her. Although Jarvis was certainly the most capable AI she’d ever met, even he couldn’t track her without her actually using technology. She’d need to worry about traffic cams, but Stark probably already knew she was coming. It would be _when_ she got there that she wanted to be a surprise.

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A wild Clint appears. Also sorry about any Deep Net inaccuracies. As someone who spends most of their time on tumblr, I had to cobble together some House of Cards references with wikipedia. This one's a bit of a shorty, but the next ones are all longer. Enjoy! Please consider leaving some love! -Red

It only took about five hours to get to DC, but she got a motel room in a town close to Dulles so she could maneuver between the airport and the city. Clint arrived later that evening. She picked him up at the airport, and they stopped in Reston for a sandwich.

“Can’t we go anyplace nice?” Clint asked, eagerly tearing into the Italian sub he got.

She shrugged. “It’s off the toll-road, and you wanted a sandwich. Convenient.”

“You know this town is crawling with spooks, right?” Clint said around a mouthful of sandwich. “I hate Virginia.”

She looked around, only seeing one table full of teenagers, laughing loudly and drinking shakes. “I don’t think we have to worry about the CIA bugging a Potbelly’s in the suburbs.”

Clint took another bite. “So where is he? Not in Reston, I hope.”

“Georgetown,” she said pushing some photos across the table at him. The first one showed an old brownstone with Tony coming down the steps. Clint looked at the second one, which showed another picture of him in a different outfit going into the building. “It’s not billionaire classy, but it’s low-key millionaire classy. I called in a few favors, and there are still enough spies in this city that it wasn’t hard to keep an eye out.”

Clint gave a thoughtful “hmm” as he reviewed the pictures. “So what’s the plan? You just going to go and ask him what the deal is?”

“Pretty much,” she replied. “Listen, Clint, I’m not sure how this is going to play out. Something’s just not right about this whole situation.” She leaned forward onto the table and crossed her arms. “And I’ve been relying on my instincts too long to start ignoring them now.”

He gave a brisk nod of understanding. “You want me to stay on the outside, watch him?”

She smirked. “You always know how to show a girl a good time.”

 

* * *

The townhouse Tony was currently inhabitating was a relatively quiet affair, nestled snugly in between two other similar buildings. Trees lined the street and driveways, muffling sound and giving the neighborhood a more park-ish look. A few people were around, jogging or walking dogs. A few cars whizzed by. Not many people in this neighborhood used public transportation.

Tony’s front door was at the top of a small staircase in the middle of the house. There were two windows on either side of it. Both these and the second floor windows all had the curtains drawn. There was no personalization on the outside, nothing to suggest the type of person that might be inhabiting the home.

She knocked on the large oak door, feeling apprehensive. She put her hands on her hips, her shoulder holster readjusting with the movement. Her jacket sleeves were also wide enough that they concealed her Widow’s Bite bracers. She didn’t anticipate having to use them, but Natasha was never one to under-prepare.

The door swung open, with a surprised-looking Tony Stark standing on the other side of it.

He looked...good, she decided. Sharply dressed in a button-down shirt and slacks, lacking any hint of the haggardness that she had grown accustomed to when he worked for long stretches.

“Tony. Can I come in?” she asked pleasantly.

His brow knit in confusion for a minute before he gave her one of his press-smiles. “Yeah. Mi casa es su casa, and all.”

She stepped into the foyer, noticing the sparse decor that reflected the aesthetic on the outside of the house. He walked into the living room off to the side of the hallway. “Can I get you something? Coffee? Scotch? That’s uh,” he gave a light laugh. “That’s pretty much all I have.”

“I’m fine, thanks,” she said, sitting lightly on one arm rest of the couch. Tony sat in a chair across the coffee table from her. He reached for a glass that was half full already, and took a sip.

“It’s good to see you, Natasha.”

She tilted her head. “Wanna tell me what’s going on?”

“You don’t watch the news?”

“You haven’t talked to anyone, not even Pepper,” she began. Tony turned his face away, but she saw his wince. “We’re a team. It’s not that we won’t support you, I’m just concerned.”

He grimaced. “I know Pepper’s probably mad at me, but this just happened really fast. I’ve been thinking a lot about it...I think I’m going to take the position.”

She waited.

“It’s...you know, I really wasn’t sure. I like the thing we have with the Avengers, and I wouldn’t...stop being Iron Man, but,” he trailed off, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. “I think there’s just a lot I could do here. For the President. Besides fund his next campaign, I mean.” He snorted, and she couldn’t keep the small smile off her face. “I actually have a lot of experience working with foreign politicians, and I have ties to the military. I’ll admit, I might not be the safest choice, but Natasha, as more and more people like us begin to take the International stage, I think I’m in a good position to work with governments to bring us all together.”

She shifted slightly. “And President Ellis likes you,” she said.

Tony grinned. “I saved his ass from exploding, of course he likes me.”

“Why haven’t you spoken to Pepper?” she asked.

Tony shrugged, wincing again. “She was so busy with the board when the announcement was made, and I was so busy with Ellis and Vance-”

“What do you know about him?” Natasha interrupted.

“Who, Vance?”

She nodded.

“He’s...fine. I mean...he’s fine.” Tony raised one eyebrow and looked at the ceiling.

“I’ve...never heard you be so neutral towards anyone in your life,” she said carefully. “Does he...does he have something on you?”

“What? Don’t be ridiculous,” Tony said in a huff. "You think I can't handle a little blackmail?"

“Then what is it?” she asked standing up. Despite herself, Natasha’s concern was rapidly turning into annoyance.

“You’re reading too much into it,” Tony said.

“I don’t think it’s unfair to read too much into you being a few heartbeats away from the Presidency and having more military power than almost anyone else alive,” she criticized.

He peered at her dangerously from under his eyebrows. “Are you insinuating something, Agent. Romanov.” His words were clipped.

“Not yet. Do I need to be?”

“I think you’d better go,” he said lowly. “It’s clear your years of espionage have really gone to your head.”

She turned to leave. “I’ll be in touch.”

She waited to see if he’d say something, but he remained silent. She sighed and left.

She got to the end of the block before Clint sidled up next to her. “That went well,” he said smugly.

She sighed. “Something’s still not right. She looked at him. “Did you see anything I didn’t?”

He grinned, holding up a USB drive. “Like a copy of his hard drive?”

She feigned appreciation. “I knew you were good for something besides target practice!”

“I only do it for the sandwiches,” he grinned.

 

* * *

Honestly, it was criminally easy to start to go through the USB. So easy that Clint had to tell Natasha to put her gun down twice when they heard footsteps outside their motel door. Both times, she simply got up to check outside the window and both times it was some innocent passerby who probably didn’t deserve to be shot for walking by their door.

“Will you sit down?” Clint grumbled, then snapped his mouth shut when Natasha gave him a look. “I was only saying-”

“Clint, are you implying that you walked into Tony Stark’s home, plugged a USB into his computer, and managed to copy all his files? This is Tony ‘I Invented the Modern Firewall’ Stark.”

“Well, I had to log into the computer first,” Clint replied. “Oh hey, look at this.”

Natasha pried the mouse from his fingers, clicking through the folders. There were quite a few files of just straight code that Natasha didn’t even pretend to understand, and others looked like they’d only ended up on the computer because Pepper had transferred them there in an attempt to make Tony care about SI.

“What exactly are we looking for?” Clint asked, crunching on a chip. Natasha shoved him away with a foot as he threatened to get crumbs over her keyboard.

“I’m not sure,” she admitted. “‘Anything suspicious’ seems a bit…”

“Vague?”

“Mhm,” Natasha trailed off. “Stark has so much information on here that it could take us years to go through it all. Maybe just sift through his email.”

“Most of this is from Vance,” he said after a moment. “Telling him where to meet him the next day. There’s one for almost every day, though.”

“That’s not unusual, considering how they’re stepping up their campaigning,” Natasha pointed out.

“Dead end, then,” Clint grumbled.

Natasha stole a chip. “You tried,” she teased.

Clint grumbled. “What next, Soviet spy?”

“I don’t know,” Natasha had to admit. “Tony’s told us to piss off, Pepper knows even less than we do, Steve’s running around in Europe, and-”

“Uh, Natasha?” Clint said, pointing to the muted television. “I don’t think Steve’s running around Europe anymore.”

Her head snapped around and both her and Clint dived for the remote at the same time. She came up with it, turning up the volume as quickly as possible. It was a rerun from earlier in the evening, by the time stamp, but it was enough to make Natasha and Clint gape at the TV.

_“-superhero drama, we have Captain America himself. Captain Rogers, how do you feel about Tony Stark as Secretary of Defense?”_

Natasha swore as the camera cut to Steve. He flashed the audience a sheepish and apologetic smile and said, _“Although I do agree that there should be more coordination between the government and so called ‘superheroes’, appointing any superhero to the cabinet on the basis of their powers is not the right way to do it. Create liaison officers for increased communication, but leave politics to-”_

Natasha hit mute. For a moment, her and Clint stared at each other.

“Well, shit,” Hawkeye said, summing it up fairly eloquently. “What happened to Munich?”

 


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who's kudo'd and reviewed so far! We appreciate it so much. Now, back to the action. -Red

Natasha ended up texting that same question to Steve later that evening. Every news network had already latched on to Captain America’s speech, repeating it ad-nauseum with headlines like _“CAPTAIN AMERICA VS. IRON MAN”_ and _“CAPTAIN AMERICA SET ON IRON MAN’S JOB?”_

It was a PR-disaster, but Natasha had never really cared about PR.  

About twenty minutes later, her phone buzzed in reply.

_Trail went cold again. Thought I could be useful here._

She stopped herself from typing her first thought in reply. He might be gearing himself up to make some sort of liaison which was admirable, but at this stage in the game he was the only one still looking at the board.

 _You hear from Stark?_ she asked instead.

_No. You?_

_Clint and I are digging, but he doesn’t seem to want anything to do with us. Or anyone._

_Is he working on something?_

She paused, considering. “Huh,” she said out loud.

“What is it?” Clint didn’t look up from where he was sitting on the floor. He had her laptop open and was still combing through all of Stark’s files.

“You didn’t see anything Stark may have been working on? Like a suit or...I don’t know, exploding things?” She was thinking back to the encounter now. Yes, the house wasn’t his initially, so it probably didn’t have a workshop. But she had always seen Stark have some project or other in his living spaces. She couldn’t imagine him spending any more than a few days in a place without something to tinker with.

“No,” Clint said carefully, and took his eyes away from the computer. “But his workshop’s not there. And he doesn’t bring his personal projects into communal areas and stuff, you’ve been in his houses.” He shrugged. “Honestly, Natasha, I think we’re grasping at straws here. I don’t know if that means anything.”

She tapped a pen idly against her knee. “Clint, I’ve never seen him in a mood like this and not working on a project. It’s how he deals with emotions. Steve may have a point.”

“Steve’s also trying to deliberately provoke the future Secretary of Defense,” Clint muttered.

She gave a noncommittal grunt, picking her phone up again.

_No projects that we know of. We’re still looking though._

_Keep me in the loop,_ was the only reply.

She sighed, plugging her phone in. “I’m going to bed,” she told Clint. “How do you feel about stakeout duty tomorrow?”

He looked up from his computer. “Well, you know I love a good romp around Georgetown followed by a trip to Ben’s Chili Bowl, but Nat, are you sure you’re not making something out of nothing?”

“No,” she said quietly. “But...I just need to be sure.”

“Yeah, okay,” he nodded. “Coffee’s on you though.”

 

* * *

They used the rental car that was still in Natasha’s possession. It was a pretty non-descript silver Corolla that blended in well. Natasha parked a block away from Tony’s house at 5AM. Clint sighed loudly in the passenger seat, but took the steaming cup of coffee out of the cup holder and sipped loudly to show his displeasure.

“This feels so cop-ish,” he mumbled tiredly.

“That’s because it _is_ cop-ish.” The superspies could do stakeouts, but it was such a vanilla chore compared to some of the things they were used to, it was no wonder Clint was bored. He booted up a tablet in his lap and began scanning news articles.

“Looks like Steve’s been sending op-eds to the New York Times,” he said after a few minutes. “Not very subtle in the opinion department, is he?”

“He’s only subtle when I’m with him,” Natasha murmured, sipping her own coffee.

“You do tend to have that effect on people,” Clint agreed.

“Not with Stark, though.” She was somewhat surprised to hear the note of sorrow in her own voice.

Clint looked sideways at her. “He doesn’t really have the personality for it. Not your fault you could never get him to calm the hell down and watch his own back. I mean, shit, he’s being rewarded for that kind of behavior right now.”

Natasha wasn’t so sure, so she remained silent. Clint would do anything for her, it was true, but she knew this “mission” was trying his patience already.

“Is Steve in DC?” Clint asked.

“I think so,” Natasha said distractedly. “The show he was on last night was filmed in the studio here. And he has an apartment here, though I don’t know if he ever plugged up the bullet holes.”

“You mean he’s not swanky like us with an apartment in the Bronx?”

“I’d hardly call your rotting-food storage safe house swanky,” she teased.

“He’s a lucky man if he doesn’t have to put up with roommates,” Clint mumbled.

She rolled her eyes and took another sip of coffee.

A black Escalade pulled onto the street from the other end of the block. They both watched attentively as it slowed to a stop in front of Tony’s townhouse.

Two men in suits stepped out, moving to Tony’s door. “Bit early to get appointed your own Secret Service detail, don’t you think?” Clint grumbled.

“They don’t have badges,” Natasha said.

“Huh,” Clint said, watching as they escorted Tony into the Escalade. “I’ve never seen Stark not drive himself somewhere.”

“He’s usually too paranoid for that. The man has a PTSD streak coupled with trust issues a mile wide. I mean, he drives around his own damn chauffeur,” Natasha said, starting the engine.

“You’re right, something here is weird. Just can’t quite put my finger on it.” Clint sounded serious for the first time in two days.

“Do you see-” she was cut off by her phone buzzing loudly and incessantly. She snatched it off the dash, to find out who was calling her at 5:30AM. “Steve?” she said out loud. Clint gave her a puzzled look. She accepted the call. “Hello?”

For a moment, she didn’t hear anything. Then there was a crash on the other end of the line. Her eyes widened, and the line went dead.

“Change of plans,” she said, tearing out of her parking spot. She drove the opposite direction of the Escalade. “Get your bow ready.”

 

* * *

Natasha made record time, blowing through more stoplights in their half-hour drive than Clint blew through sandwiches in a week. Although the morning rush hour was beginning, she only hit traffic when she ended up on the highway.

“Nat, you’re going to hit their bumper,” Clint said, as she impatiently took her foot off the break for the fourth time since they’d been forced to stop on the exit ramp.

“Goddamn _traffic_ ,” she snarled. “If they don’t move, I’m going to-”

“Plough the car into them?” Clint said.

Natasha gave him a look, seriously tempted to strangle him. Luckily for Clint’s neck, the car in front of them _did_ decide to move. They inched forward slowly towards the next traffic light, each stop and start wearing on Natasha’s nerves. Beside her, Clint breathed an audible sigh of relief than yelped when she put her foot on the gas.

“No, no, no, nonono - Romanov, I swear to God - you’re going to get us arrested!”

Natasha calmly took her foot off the gas, turn done, and righted the car. “They were on a red light,” she said slowly.

“That doesn’t mean you can drive on the wrong side of the road!” Clint said.

“Eat a chip,” Natasha said. “It’ll make you feel better.”

“It will _not_ make me feel better,” Clint grumbled, settling back into his seat. Admittedly, Natasha did feel a slight measure of guilt as she swerved the car across two lanes, narrowly missing a SUV. “Look, if we get pulled over and ticketed for reckless driving, it’s going to slow us down.”

“More backup when we reach Steve’s, then,” Natasha said airily, although she personally suspected that the cops were probably paying more attention to the subway and roads leading into the capitol on days like this. “Breathe, Barton, I don’t want you passing out before we get there.”

“Easy for you to say,” he replied. “Bet this is how people drive in Russia, isn’t it?”

“This is far from the worst I’ve put you through,” Natasha felt obliged to point out as she slowed the car. “Sneaky or explosive?”

Clint hummed as he thought. “After all this effort to get here quickly? They probably heard your brakes from a mile away.”

“Good point,” she conceded, and just to spite him, slammed on the breaks with a little more vigor than necessary as she pulled the car in front of Roger’s apartment complex. Clint, twisting to grab his bow from the back, cursed good-naturedly at her.

Natasha took the stairs up to Steve’s floor quickly, Clint shadowing her. When they reached the landing, she pointed to one side of the door and went to the other. Clint went to where she’d pointed, crouching with bow in hand.

She raised her hands and signed, _Check lock?_

Clint nodded, reaching up and testing the door handle. It turned easily in his grasp, and he mouthed _unlocked_.

Natasha frowned. _Opening on three._

He nodded again, and with one hand Natasha counted down. When she hit three, Clint turned the lock and she threw herself against the door, sending it flying open and crashing against the wall.

 _Sorry, Steve_ , she thought as she rolled to the first bit of cover she found. Carter wasn’t in town right now, which meant his only other neighbor who could have heard was the workaholic engineer.

Clint followed behind her, breaking to the other side as the door closed with a thud. They shared a frown with one another, and after a quick moment of silent communication, went into different rooms. Their sweep was quick, but efficient, and Natasha was left more confused than not as the apartment looked exactly as it had when she’d last seen it.

They met back up where they’d started, still crouched behind cover. Clint was the first to stand.

“Uh, Nat?” he asked. “This doesn’t look like there was much of a struggle.”

Natasha stood as well, grimacing as she did so. She’d caught a glimpse of the immaculate room on the way in, but had been more concerned with checking for enemies than looking at Rogers’ interior decorating. “No, it doesn’t,” she agreed slowly, turning to take in the furniture. The only thing suspicious was the lack of dust, and even that was in keeping with Steve’s military background.

Clint ambled into the next room, bow still ready in his hands but his posture relaxed now that they’d ascertained the lack of immediate danger. “Are these bullet holes new or old?”

Natasha followed, poking her head through the doorway. Her adrenaline was beginning to fade, but something still told her that all was not right in the apartment. “Those are from Barnes,” she confirmed.

Clint checked the angle, looking at where Barnes’ shot had passed through the wall to hit Fury. He let out a low whistle. “Nice. I want to meet this guy when you find him. Bow doesn’t have enough power for a shot like this, but man, this time in Srebrenica-”

“When we find Steve’s brainwashed Soviet assassin friend and _if_ he doesn’t kill us, I’ll be sure to let you two boys compare shots,” Natasha interjected, crouching down to examine the outlets. They weren’t even scratched, so it was unlikely any cords had been pulled out in a hurry in any sort of a struggle.

“Hey, you’re _my_ brainwashed Soviet assassin friend, and you’ve never tried to kill me,” Clint protested as he went over to Steve’s cabinets and lowered himself to check for anything underneath.

Natasha snorted and walked . “Who else would I get to do my grunt work?”

Clint called after her, “Hey, I heard that!”

“You were supposed to,” she muttered as she examined the kitchen. All the knives were in their proper drawer and all the appliances were hot. Natasha made her way to the coffee pot, placing a finger on the edge of the glass and frowning when she found it slightly warm to the touch. It was completely empty, not a trace of coffee inside.

“Find anything?” Clint asked as he made his way into the room.

“Pot’s still warm,” Natasha said. “Empty though.”

“So we have a warm coffeepot and a clean apartment. Seriously, I haven’t seen a place so clean in my life - it’s like a hotel in here. It makes me nervous.”

“Me too,” Natasha said, but for different reasons. “It’s…”

“Ninja senses tingling?”

“I don’t know,” Natasha replied. “I want to say yes, but…”

“Maybe the dude went for a run,” Barton shrugged. “We can hang around here and see if he comes back.”

“I’m wondering if it was a decoy to draw us from Stark,” she admitted.

“And we fell for it? We’re here now - might as well do some more investigating,” Clint said. Natasha glanced out the window, grimacing at her lousy parking job but also not seeing any sign of watchers too interested in Steve’s apartment.

“You’re probably right,” she sighed. “Steve probably has a box of Cap’n Crunch if you’re hungry.”

“Captain America eats Cap’n Crunch for breakfast? I thought he always seemed like the Wheaties sort.”

“Sharon’s niece likes them,” she explained, following him to the pantry and almost running into Clint as he stopped dead. She glanced over his shoulder and frowned.

“No Cap’n Crunch, then?” Clint asked as they stared into the empty pantry.

 

* * *

While Clint moved the car to a less conspicuous location, Natasha continued to prowl around the empty apartment. None of the pieces were fitting quite right - Steve had been in New York for the last month, and didn’t trust a housekeeper. By all rights, there should have been dust at least in the corners of the shelves. Even Steve didn’t care about dusting the back of the top shelf, and when Natasha had climbed on top of the dresser, even that had been swept clean.

For a man that ate at least four times the amount of food Natasha did, the empty pantry was also highly suspect. She’d also checked and hadn’t seen any coffee mugs in the dishwasher, which meant he’d taken it with him or he’d cleaned it by hand. Natasha chewed on a fingernail while she stood in the kitchen, slowly turning in a circle.

When the door open and closed, she called out, “Clint, come here so I can attack you.”

Clint edged his way slowly into the room, looking like the movement was entirely against his better judgement. “Uh,” he said, “Pass?”

“I want to try something,” she said. Clint took a step back. “Go stand in front of the pantry and be Rogers.”

Natasha handed him a coffee mug as he reluctantly made his way to the pantry. “Go ahead and reach into the pantry, like you’re going to pull out something,” she urged.

Clint did so, complaining as he went, “Why am I always the helpless victim?”

“You’re Captain America, you’re not exactly-” as Clint’s shoulder relaxed slightly as she spoke, Natasha jumped forward and sent Clint crashing into the shelves. Two of the lower ones broke easily under his weight, and he ended up sprawled on a stack of already rumpled paper towels.

“That explains the crash,” she said slowly as Clint spluttered with indignation. “But nothing else makes sense - those shelves shouldn’t have broken as easily as they did.”

“Can I get off the floor now?” Clint grumbled as he rolled over to face her, a half broken mug in his hand.

“Hand me some of the wood?” she asked. Clint sat up and handed her part of a shelf. She ran her finger over the edge. “It’s been glued back together,” she pointed out, and pushed Clint to the floor with a toe. He was curious enough to capitulate. “See anything from that angle.”

“The one shelf you managed to not break has a crack running through the middle of it. Looks like wood glue,” Clint sat back up, looking curiously at her. “What are you thinking, Nat?”

Natasha put the piece of wood on the counter, then walked back to slide the top shelf free. She turned it over with a frown. Pantry lining had been placed over the top, probably an attempt to hide the fact that they hadn’t painted over it. The crack went all the way through the wood, and the glue wasn’t completely dried.

“It could be nothing,” she said. “But if you wanted to take someone, and didn’t want anyone to know, what would you do?”

Clint looked at her. “I’m guessing that ‘burn the house down’ isn’t a valid response?” Although his tone was joking, his face was just as serious as hers.

Natasha bit her lip, giving Clint a hand to his feet. “The cleanup is textbook perfect, like something out of my old training manuals,” she said. “But… why?”

“It’s not like Captain America has many enemies,” Clint said. “At least, subtle ones. Especially after the Avengers - a lot of circles are talking about how a public hit on him would be a good way to get their names out there.”

“After the Avengers, all of us-” Natasha and Clint stared at each other. “Tony.”


	5. Chapter 5

They made their way back to Tony’s apartment. There was a distinct possibility that the same fate had befallen Tony but it may already have been too late. They decided it’d be best to retrace their steps, maybe catch something they’d missed earlier when Tony had left in such a hurry. The entire situation was weird, even for them. Clint had been calling Steve’s phone, but it kept going straight to voicemail.

They were just passing The Williard when Clint shot up straight in his seat.

“Stop the car!” Clint shouted and Natasha slammed on the brakes, coming to a full stop in the bus lane. “Son of a bitch,” growled Clint.

She looked across the street to the patio and saw none other than Tony Stark enjoying a continental breakfast with several people that looked to be Congressmen. The men in black suits who had picked him earlier were standing some distance away lording over the patio like bodyguards.

Natasha felt her eye twitch and a new thought occurred to her. “Do you think it’s weird Steve disappeared in suspicious circumstances the day after he loudly and publicly criticized Tony’s decision?”

She looked at Clint, but he kept his face a mask. “That’s low, Nat.” he said quietly, but she could tell the thought had occurred to him too. Neither of them wanted to admit it. For all his faults, Tony was one of the few people they trusted.

A bus honked from somewhere behind them, and Natasha cursed before pulling slowly back out into traffic.

“We need to find Steve,” she said.

“Yeah, no shit,” Clint said, frustration leaking into his voice. “I’m going to try and get video feeds from Steve’s apartment building. It’s nice enough I’m pretty sure they have a network connection.” She heard him ruffle around in his bag before pulling out her laptop. “Uhhhh…”

“What is it?”

“Your entire desktop is blacked out and there’s just a pop up dialogue box with a flashing cursor.”

“What?”

“It’s typing,” Clint said. Natasha pulled into a parking lot and took the laptop from Clint. She looked at the dialogue box.

_How do I know you’re not FBI?_

She hesitated. She glanced at Clint who looked confused. She turned back to the keyboard, and began typing. _You don’t. I just have a friend that has some suspicious dealings with a congressman and I want to know if this is related._

_That’s very vague, came the reply._

_I’m not FBI or CIA but I have had previous dealings with S.H.I.E.L.D. I can help you, if your cause is just._ Clint was peering over her shoulder. _I have friends in high places._

_That’s precisely why I’m concerned._

She bit the inside of her cheek. _You’re desperate enough to reach out to me._

“Who’s your new Deep Net friend?” Clint asked.

“Not sure yet,” she replied honestly.

_Can you protect me?_

She grimaced. _No. But I won’t sell you out._

_Give me a drop point in D.C. and I’ll give you pictures. You’re the only one who believes me._

“Nat, we don’t have time for this,” Clint growled. She ignored him and typed a street corner a few blocks away from where they were currently. The reply was she’d have information tomorrow. The communication ended, and her laptop screen referred to normal. She handed it back to Clint.

“Too bad Windows 7 doesn’t come with built in Deep Net protection,” he mused.

“I just don’t want to miss anything. Even if it’s unrelated, it could be good material for later.”

“Look at you, filling up your political blackmail briefcase.”

“Just find Steve,” she said with exasperation.

 

* * *

They waited. Then they waited some more.

“I hate being a spy,” Clint grumbled from where he’d been lounging in the back seat.

“No, you don’t,” Natasha replied automatically.

If she hadn’t been so distracted, she wouldn’t have given him the ammunition to create his own entertainment. Clint jumped on the opportunity to argue, “You know, when I signed up it was for the chance to shoot people. Not to watch old ladies walk their dogs.”

“You signed up because Coulson threatened to shoot you if you didn’t,” Natasha replied automatically. Even if it was annoying to talk in circles around Clint Barton, it at least gave her something to do rather than continue to let her eyes roam the sidewalk for anyone who could be her “Deep Net Dude” (Clint had been the one to come up with the moniker and refused to acknowledge him as anything else). Just because Natasha was capable of sitting stationary in silence for days at a time didn’t mean she necessarily enjoyed it.

“No, I signed up because - okay, that’s maybe a bit true. But still, it’s not like the recruiting pamphlet said _‘you’re more likely to die of boredom than of enemy snipers’.”_

“We didn’t have a recruiting pamphlet, SHIELD was classified.”

“No, _you_ didn’t have a recruiting pamphlet, because I used it to - hey, what’s that?”

Natasha, who had been watching a particularly suspicious looking pomeranian being walked by a twenty-something dressed a little too shabbily for the area, snapped her gaze back to the corner.

“Did you see who dropped it?” she demanded, narrowing her eyes at the box.

“Thought they were slowing to make a turn,” Clint said. “White truck a block away, one of those shitty metallic ‘support our troops’ ribbons in the corner. Weren’t those out in 2006? Didn’t get the plates- you going to follow?”

“Don’t want to spook him,” Natasha said. “I’ll pull up, you hop out and grab it. Meet me back at the parking lot. Make sure the camera gets a decent look at your face - Stark’s looking for me, but I doubt he knows you’re with me. Deep Net-”

“Dude. Deep Net Dude.” Clint interjected when she paused and made a face.

“Probably wants to run some scans and make sure we are who we say we are,” she continued, pulling the car forward slowly as Clint moved to the front seat. When she drifted to a stop at the stopsign, Clint opened his door. As Natasha pulled off, he made his way up the sidewalk into the 7-Eleven.

Natasha made a casual loop of the area, returning to the lot they’d originally started in. Clint, icee in hand, ambled his way back down to the stop sign. While he waited for the car closest to him to make a turn, Clint dropped as though to tie his shoe. By the time the car had fully passed him, he was straightened back up and the small box was nowhere in sight.

It was another twenty minutes before he meandered his way back to their rental car, and Natasha held out her hand expectantly.

“Get your own,” he said, sipping at the icee.

_“Barton.”_

“Oh, this is what you want?”

Natasha had to admire his sleight of hand - if she hadn’t spent years watching him do the same intricate tricks, she may have been surprised by the box that neatly appeared on the dashboard between them.

“For me?” she asked coyly. “But it’s not my birthday for another three-”

“Last year you said it was in June,” Clint said with a frown.

Natasha smirked, picking up the package. “Did I now?” As she slit the tape neatly with her knife, Clint leaned in for a closer look. “Let’s see what our friend left us.”

 

* * *

Predictably, there was no wifi card in the tablet, and no network connection. Natasha turned it on, and the only thing on the home screen was six black and white pictures. She pulled them up. She scrolled through quickly. They were all of a lab, and they all showed men in suits shaking hands with men in lab coats.

“That’s the Chair of the House Appropriations Committee,” Clint pointed out.

“And the man next to him is Gregory Vance,” Natasha said dryly. One of the pictures had a massive piece of machinery in the foreground, emblazoned with a logo. “What’s the Simone Group?” she asked.

“Chemical and bioengineering, I think. Been trying to break onto the government scene for a while,” Clint answered. He was resting his chin in one palm, his elbow on the armrest between them as he looked over Natasha’s shoulder.

“Do you mean, biochemical weapons?” Natasha asked, looking at him with worry.

Clint shrugged. “Not sure. All I know is I used to know a guy at SHIELD who carried around some prototypes of their stuff. He always threatened to spray it on us if we stole his lunch, said it’d make us bleed out of our eyeballs.” He ran a hand over his hair. “Come to think of it, I think that guy turned out to be Hydra…”

“Not surprising.” She scrolled through the pictures again. “No one here is bleeding out of their eyeballs though.”

“Deep Net Dude’s probably just giving you a piece of the pie, seeing what you’ll do with it before he gives up the whole thing.” Clint leaned back into his own seat and opened up their laptop.

“It’s good information though. Do you think Stark knows?”

“About his bioweapon buddy? Hard to say.” He did a quick google search. “Popular consensus seems to be various members of the Cabinet publically condemned the company, saying they weren’t interested in that type of warfare.”

&lquoSo it is under the table, and not just our disconnect with politics.”

Clint raised an eyebrow. “Speak for yourself, I knew the Chair of the Appropriations Committee on sight.”

“Didn’t you have a mission to tail the guy in the Caribbean once?”

Clint tapped his temple. “Which is why I knew him on sight. What’s this?” he said turning back to the laptop. “Oh, thanks for asking, Natasha, it’s just the footage from Steve’s parking garage finally downloaded.”

Now it was her turn to lean across the car as the footage started playing. The camera showed a door, presumably to some sort of service elevator in a parking garage. Clint fast forwarded through the footage, because there was almost no one using the back door between midnight and 5AM. He slowed it down then, and they watched in silence as four masked men in tactical gear used some kind of heated laser to cut a hole in the doorknob. They opened the door and moved quickly up the stairs. Clint forwarded through again, until they saw the men coming back down, dragging a hooded and bound Steve Rogers between them.

“They must have surprised him, since they weren’t even good enough to take out security,” Natasha mused.

“They were though, they had it on one continuous loop. I had to get a hacker friend to do a rush job,” Clint said.

Natasha gave him a dubious look. “What hacker friend?”

“Jarvis,” Clint grinned. “Who knew, once I emailed him what was going on, Short Circuit was as concerned for Steve as we were. He said something like ‘I’m pleased to see you looking out for your teammates.’ ”

“Did he say anything about Tony?”

“No,” Clint’s face slipped back into serious mode. “But apparently we’re not on J’s bad side yet.”

“That might be about to change,” Natasha growled, heading back to Tony’s townhouse.

“Whoa, hold up,” Clint said, words tripping over each other. “We can’t just piss off the future Sec of Defense.”

“I think we already have,” Natasha made sure her words were steady as she made her next turn. “We have enough evidence to make sure Stark knows something is suspicious, and now he can’t claim that we’re just grasping at threads.”

“What do we have?” Clint asked as Natasha switched lanes. “We have Vance shaking hands with some dudes in a lab coat. Tony’s in bioengineering himself and he’s not making bioweapons. So far, they’ve never released public records of their weapons. As far as the public’s concerned, they’re still trying to-”

“Stark’s not the public,” Natasha interjected. Damn Barton for being rational. “At the very least, he’ll admit something’s wrong with Steve even _if_ -”

“He decides not turn on his new BFF? I heard what he said last time you criticized the two of them. _That’s_ more than just Vance pushing his nomination.”

“What do you want me to do, Clint?” Natasha blew out a sigh. “We need to find Steve. Something about this nomination doesn’t sit right with me - it’s not just the fact that a politician not directly involved with the nominations is trying to get a civilian into one of the most influential positions in the country.”

“It’s not as though Mr. “I Privatized Peace” is protesting it. The only faster aboutface I’ve seen is you leaving the Red Room. So unless Tony’s secretly been a Soviet spy this whole time…” Clint trailed off as the joke went flat. “What exactly are you planning on saying to him?”

“I’m going to show him the video of Steve being taken,” she said. “I don’t want to give him the tablet - Jarvis is good. If our informant -”

“It won’t kill you to call him Deep Net Dude.”

“If our informant finds any trace leading back to him, he might start running,” Natasha continued as she stopped outside Tony’s street. “Are you coming in?”

He hesitated. “Maybe I should speak to him.” Natasha glanced at him despite herself. “Look, so far he’s just known about you, right? You already have Stark’s back up, and although I know you’re capable of getting the information we want…”

“He’s a friend, not a mark?” Natasha asked.

“I’m just saying you don’t do warm and fuzzy well,” Clint said, a grin tugging at the corners of her lips. Something was odd about it - it took Natasha a moment, but he refused to meet her eyes as they spoke. “You’ve done bad cop, let me do good cop.”

Natasha took her foot off the brake. “Okay, Barton,” she said slowly. “I’ll let you play warm and fuzzy.”

“Also, Stark has better food than you do,” Clint smirked. “I’m leaving my bow in the back - meet up at Steve’s apartment?”

“He won’t mind if we stay,” Natasha agreed and slowed outside Stark’s townhome. “Besides, the run will do you good. I saw how slowly you did your sweep of his home.”

“Securing an area is a delicate business,” Clint argued as he opened his door. He gave his bow a slightly wistful look as he climbed out of the car. “Don’t let anything happen to that bow, I just got new limbs.”

“Separation anxiety isn't healthy,” Natasha teased, rolling down her window after he’d closed the door. She took the opportunity to look over the area. Tony’s home looked suspiciously deserted - only one car in the driveway, and no sight of his earlier goons. Maybe he was off in more… meetings. The thought wasn’t a pleasant one.

“It’s not separation anxiety. Did you know with it’s next upgrades-”

“Sure, Barton,” she waved him off, rolling the window back up. She made sure that when she pulled away, it was vaguely in the direction of Steve’s apartment. She’d drop off the bow first - just in case Clint had finally added the tracker to it - before grabbing some supplies from Steve’s and going some snooping of her own.

It was time to pay that congressman of Stark’s a visit.

 


	6. Chapter 6

Natasha was no stranger to hanging around congressional offices and waiting for opportunities to present themselves. She didn’t have time to steal anyone’s badge and sneak around in the congressional cafeteria, but luckily Vance wasn’t the type of person to dine in the Congressional cafeteria.

She idled on the side of the street as she watched Vance with a group of about six other men head to a nearby, nondescript building that was a favorite hangout for congressmen. She’d had dinner there a few times. Even though it was only lunch, her jacket and jeans weren’t anywhere appropriate. Something like this generally always happened though, and she was prepared.

She reached into the back of the car and pushed Clint’s spare quiver off one of her own bags. Inside was a casual business suit and blouse. It was a little wrinkled, but passable. She also had a pair of pumps to complete the ensemble.

After she parked her car in a nearby garage, she went into the steakhouse, giving the hostess a quick line about how she was meeting someone there. She sat at the bar and kept an eye out on the table Vance was currently at.

Eventually Vance got up to go to the restroom. She waited a minute before following him.

He was at the sink, looking at his cellphone when she entered. “Uh, this is-” he started but then his eyes narrowed and he turned his head to one side. “Do I...know you?”

“I should hope so. My face has been on the news enough times recently to render me out of a job.” She gave him a small smirk.

His eyes widened in surprise. “Uh, Black W-Miss Romanov,” he corrected himself. He also corrected his facial features, hiding the surprise that he first registered and replacing it with an indifference she could tell was feigned. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

She moved over to the sink and lifted herself onto it, making sure he had a clear view of her thighs. “It seems you’re in the business of employing Avengers in government seats,” she said. “I’ve found myself a bit….bored lately, and I was wondering if there was anything I could do to maybe…” she lifted an eyebrow and tilted her head. “...help?”

He cleared his throat. “I’ve been campaigning to get Stark the Secretary position, true, but I don’t think I really have any job openings for someone with your particular set of skills.”

“You misunderstand,” she said sweetly. “I don’t want a position in the cabinet. I’m talking about the work you’re doing with the Simone Group.”

There was a flicker of surprise in his eyes before a smug look returned to his face. “Miss Romanov, I don’t have any idea about what you’re talking about. In fact, as I recall, the President has publicly denounced the Simone Group. It would be bad form to work with them.”

She looked out at him from underneath her eyelashes. “I’m all about bad form.”

“What’s your interest in this anyway?” Vance asked, not falling for the ruse.

She shrugged. “I’m a spy without a job. Everyone knows my name. I can only get so far as a...superhero. I’m looking for something more. I want something to do that’s worthwhile. And I don’t want to be on a losing side.”

She abandoned the counter top slowly walking up to him with her arms crossed over her chest. She narrowed her eyes and got uncomfortably close to him, radiating power. Her next words were quiet, but firm. “Are you the losing side, Vance?”

She had him now. Vance was a man who couldn’t turn down having two Avengers in his debt, clearly. The man was addicted to power, and no one else in the world had more power than the Avengers right now.

“I might have something,” he said slowly. He took out his phone. “Leave me your contact info, I’ll let you know. Does Stark know what you’re doing?”

“No. Why should he? He’s gone behind my back before. Let’s see how he likes it.”

Vance gave a small smirk. “Intergroup power plays, huh? Interesting.”

“Don’t tell me you don’t know anything about that,” she said lightly.

His lip curled in a way said not only did he know about them, he played to win. They exchanged phone numbers and an email.

He smiled smugly, returning his phone to his pocket. “I look forward to working with you, Miss Romanoff.” He left the bathroom.

“Likewise,” she growled. She didn’t go back into the restaurant, instead diverting herself through the kitchen and out the back way. She got her car and returned to Steve’s apartment.

To her surprise, Clint was already there, lounging in a chair with a bag of frozen peas on his face.

“What happened to you?” she asked, taken aback.

“Oh, you know, just waiting for you to get back so I could tell you what an absolute jerkwad Stark is,” he said, moving the bag of peas off his face. She winced when she saw how his left eye was beginning to darken and swell. “Take the scenic route?”

“I hope that’s not your dominant eye,” she said, taking her pumps off and ignoring his question.

“No, luckily. What about you, go to a fancy lunch without me?” He replaced the bag.

“In a manner of speaking. I’m sort of working for Vance now.”

Clint blinked his good eye a few times before he spoke. “What?”

“He doesn’t trust me and of course denied any involvement with the Simone Group, but he said he’d contact me. It wasn’t hard, just had to dangle some power plays in front of him. Now, what happened to you?”

He sighed. “I know you mentioned the birthday incident and his pretty spectacular fall out with Rhodes, but I thought he’d at least have to be drunk to punch me in the face.”

“He was drunk?” she asked with surprise.

“No.”

She straightened up and put her hands on her hips while a look of disbelief crossed her face. “You mean you just stood there while a sober Tony Stark punched you in the face.”

Clint grimaced, but didn’t reply, probably already feeling the situation was embarrassing enough.

“ _What_ did you say to him?”

Clint waved his hand vaguely and didn’t look at her. “I may have _inferred_ he cared more about his nomination than his team.”

Natasha pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration. She should have known Clint would take it pretty personally that someone would so readily leave the shaky bond they’d all been forming. But then again, she supposed she had taken it personally too. They all had.

“Also maybe that he didn’t care about Steve since he’d gone missing.” He looked at her sheepishly.

“How’d he react to that?”

“You mean besides punching me?” Clint shrugged. “Seemed like it was news to him. I left pretty quickly after that though, so I don’t know what he’s up to now.”

“So much for Good Cop,” she mumbled.

Her laptop, which was open on the kitchen counter, gave off the chime of an incoming message. She went over to it, seeing the desktop blanked out again. As soon as she was standing in front of it, a new dialogue box opened.

_Do you know something about this?_

“Our informant is calling,” she said. She heard Clint get up and move behind her.

_About what?_

The dialogue box disappeared and there was a video of a room they recognized now to belong to the Simone Group. According to the time stamp, it was also live. Four men were struggling to bring a fifth one into the lab. The fifth man was bound, hooded, and had a very familiar physique.

“Shit,” she heard Clint breathe out from behind her.

The video disappeared and the dialogue box popped up again.

_?_

_We’re on our way_ , she answered. _Don’t do anything differently. We’ll take care of it. I need an address._

The address of the lab popped up a moment later. She told Clint who punched it into her phone. She quickly tore out of her business casual clothes, reaching for the pile of street clothes she’d dropped on the floor when she came in. “Start the car, I’ll be down in a sec.”

“You and your wardrobes, we got people to save, Nat!” Clint shouted as he ran out the door.

 

* * *

She let Clint drive. It was the most sensible option, even if the loss of control made her grit her teeth. It was worth it, however, because it gave her the opportunity to go through the duffle bag she’d grabbed from under Steve’s bed.

“What’s the plan?” Clint asked as he took a turn just a hair too fast.

“Since I’m working the Vance angle, I can’t let him see my face,” Natasha admitted. Even the fact that one of the attackers was a woman would probably give him pause. He’d probably also seen enough of her fighting style to recognize the distinctive Red Room tactics she knew. Gun it was. Natasha fished through the bag, grabbing two guns that looked fairly serviceable and a few knives as well. Apparently Rogers had developed a healthy sense of paranoia and self preservation since Hydra had come swarming out of the woodwork.

“Going with guns?” Clint asked, glancing to the side. “Bow in or out?”

Natasha mulled it over. “Think Tony will mention that you paid him a visit?”

“Considering I pissed him off enough that he punched me, I’m sure there will be some form of venting. To Vance? I don’t know.”

“Remind me why I thought you were going to go over and be subtle?” Natasha asked, then cut him off when she saw him open his mouth. “That was rhetorical, Barton. Take the next left and merge on.”

Clint nodded, flicking on his blinker. “Does it matter if he knows I’m involved?”

“Depends. What did you say about me?” Either way, Natasha could work with it. If Clint had admitted Natasha was the one that pulled him in, then they’d need to be as circumspect as a Soviet trained human missile and a carnival archer that used to run around dressed in purple could be. Otherwise, they’d have a little more leeway, but that wouldn’t excuse them from being careful.

“Uh,” Clint trailed off. “Nothing other than that you’d been the one to mention the nomination. We didn’t get very far on sharing our feelings before, you know…”

He trailed off as he merged onto the highway, and Natasha checked to make sure no one was in his blind spot. It gave her the chance to glance at his face, which was just as hard as his tone. Apparently, Clint had been feeling a bit more hurt than he’d let on. Once they had Steve back, they could regroup and hash things out with Stark _again_.

Or maybe there would be no hashing things out with Stark. Natasha knew better than most that not all bridges could be fixed - or even that people always _wanted_ to start mending them. Although Stark was volatile on the best of days, hitting people who had fought and could have easily died beside him was approaching a new low.

“Maybe we’re looking at this the wrong way,” Natasha said slowly. Clint glanced at her, obviously picking up on the slight change of tone in her voice.

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“Look, we keep talking about _why_ Tony’s doing this and about what it’s doing to the team. It’s entirely plausible that he doesn’t want there to be a team - after all, what happened when the Mandarin was threatening him?” Natasha had to ask it, even if she was far from thrilled about it. Her growing thought didn’t ring quite true, but they were both thinking it. “We didn’t get a phone call, text message, or even a notification from Jarvis was he was still alive. You and I, we might be looking at this from an entirely different angle than Stark.”

“What, that we like being a team? Bullethole in Mongolia says differently,” Clint joked, but his knuckles had tightened on the steering wheel. Clint did deadpan well, but had never needed to learn to hide all the cues his body liked to give up.

“That was before we started working together. I also wasn’t trying to kill you,” Natasha, momentarily diverted, said. She dropped the duffle bag to the bottom of the car and began to dissemble the first of her guns. Although she trusted Rogers to keep his equipment in order, she didn’t know the last time he’d checked the conditions of his growing armory. “And don’t change the subject.”

“If I was trying to change the subject, I’d be talking about how you look like a proud momma bird as you go through Rogers’ stash,” Clint said.

“As a Russian, the corruption of Captain America is quite the achievement,” Natasha inserted smoothly.

Clint made a vaguely worrisome noise that may have been him choking. “Wait, you and he-”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Natasha said, and reached for her phone to take a picture of Clint’s face. It wasn’t an expression she’d seen in a while from him, and it made her laugh as she looked at the picture. She’d send it to Hill next time she needed a favor. “Days on the run, with Hydra out to get us and no one but each other? Sound familiar?”

He scowled at her, recognizing the joke a moment too late. “That was low,” he said, even though there was a grin starting to appear on his mouth. “It also sounds like a bad Bourne movie.”

“Right up to the point where you realize that Stark might not want our help because he doesn’t consider us friends,” Natasha said, her tone harsher than she’d have liked. Immediately, the grin slipped off Clint’s face. _Gotcha._

“I take it back,” he said. “ _That_ was low. It’s not like the guy invited us to his Tower or anything.”

“Take the next turn off, we’re almost there,” Natasha said. “I’m just saying, it might not matter what we find at the bottom of this.”

“You know him better than I do,” Clint hedged. “You’re the one that didn’t want him recruited by Fury for the lack of Wildcat spirit, and his narcissistic, self-destructive impulses.”

“Those are the reasons that I gave Fury. I rejected Stark because if I were anyone else, I would have known him exactly as well as he wanted me to,” Natasha corrected. “And it’s possible that Stark just wants to be left alone at this point.”

Clint pondered on that, and Natasha watched his thought process play out on his face. After they’d exited the highway and stopped at a red light, he turned to face her. “Do you really believe that?”

Natasha met his eyes steadily, mulling over if he’d prefer the truth or the lie. “What do you think?”

Clint was the one to break eye contact, and he glanced back at the stoplight as though he was hoping it would turn. At last he said, “Bow in or out?”

“Out,” Natasha replied. “Judging by the plans our informant sent us, Steve’s likely going to be held in the labs on the fourth floor. Since I spoke to Vance, he probably will have employees looking for my face.”

“I’ll be going in through the front then,” Clint picked up on the pieces quickly enough. “I’ve been hanging around Banner and Stark long enough that I should be able to bullshit my way into the lab. Everyone needs a coffee dude who knows physics, right?”

“This is a biochemical engineering research facility,” Natasha replied. “I think they probably live on coffee.”

“So I’ll get my way in through the front. Any idea if they need access cards?” Clint rolled his eyes as Natasha stared at him. “Right, biochemical engineering facility. I’ll just give the door guy coffee and play the overeager intern tripping over themselves. Or, you know, punch him in the face. Where will you be?”

“The building backs right up to the Severn. Nothing’s been built up on that side, so I’ll see if there’s a fire escape or rooftop entry. If I need to, there’s always the windows.”

“Biochemical engineering research facility with military grade weapons,” Clint pointed out a tad too smugly. “I’m sure the glass is bulletproof.”

“Not if you open the window,” Natasha said. “Nothing he gave us is very detailed - we’re going to have to wait until we get there to plan specifics. What matters is getting Rogers, and getting out.”

“Don’t forget his shield,” Clint said. Natasha blinked at him; she  _had_ completely forgotten about the shield. “You didn’t see it anywhere in the apartment, did you?”

“Grab it if you see it,” Natasha said. “It’ll be useful for if they start shooting at us.”

“What if we pull a Venice?” Clint asked suddenly. “If Vance thinks you’re really wanting to one-up Stark and are going solo, then it might work.”

Natasha stared at him. If she had a list of every ridiculous plan Clint came up for breakouts… actually, this one wouldn’t make it on there. “You’re an idiot,” she decided. “I think it might actually work, as long as you get the shield first. It’ll also give me a look inside the building.”

“The things I do for this team,” Clint said woefully. “If you get me shot, Romanov...”

“Isn’t that the point?” Natasha asked mischievously. Clint huffed dramatically, then brightened.

“Can I take my bow, then?”


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for waiting. I was in the computer labs until 5:30AM and then I had class. Ahh, the life of a game dev, woo. ANYWAY, hope this answers some questions. Thanks for reading, and leave some love! -Red

A quick trip to Starbucks and Clint was set. Natasha leaned across the seat to rumple his collar, glancing at the trickle of people returning from their lunch break. Most of them looked fairly put together - some had on suits and likely belonged to management. One or two wore jeans, so probably worked directly in the lab. Clint’s casual slacks, gym bag, and button down would blend in with the hapless, attention-seeking interns well enough.

The building itself was fairly standard fare. It looked like any manner of downtown buildings in America; large windows allowed managers and supervisors to look down at the plebeians on the sidewalk far below, while all the labs were probably located in the inner part of the building, out of sight from anyone wanting corporate secrets.

“Don’t screw this up,” she advised him.

“Always a ray of sunshine,” Clint joked, even though there was a bit of a tense line to his mouth. “Deep Net Dude’s gunna hate us, though.”

“I think he’ll understand,” Natasha said, even if she was feeling slightly skeptical herself. “I’ll give you twenty minutes, and if you don’t text by then, the plan’s off. They’re probably jamming audio communications within the building, so wires and comms. are out. A text should get through as long as you piggyback on the wifi.”

“Half an hour,” Clint replied. He’d chosen the small tube he kept his bow in, and had done a credible job of disguising it. Likely the man on guard duty would probably be more concerned with hot coffee being spilled down his front than any odds and ends in an intern’s bag. “I expect you to call in an airstrike if you don’t hear from me by then.”

“I don’t think that’s the type of rescue Rogers would appreciate,” Natasha replied cheerily. “This is for him, after all.”

“Airstrikes are better than flowers,” Clint shook his head sadly. “If you’ve truly corrupted Captain America, he’d agree with me.”

“This is why you aren’t married,” Natasha shot back. “Good luck, Barton.”

“Aw, you do care,” Clint said as she got out of the car. “Please don’t get me killed.”

She gave him a sweet smile and slammed the door. Clint pulled away towards the building and she watched him go. They’d pulled off something like this before, but the plan was risky - and fragile - enough that she was worried any of its many variables could go wrong. Although she’d poured quite a bit of effort into teaching Clint to be less of a soldier and more of a spy, his training had always been that of an assassin’s. Even if he complained about stakeouts, he was far more suited to sitting on a building watching a target through a scope than he was with believing his own lies.

As Natasha stared at her phone, she knew it was for the best that she was the latter because today, Rogers’ life probably depended on that skill. The plan itself was a simple one - Clint would break in with just his bow, because that could usually be smuggled past security. His arrows were a bit trickier to pull off, but so long as the tips weren’t in place they looked enough like scientific tools to get by. Once Clint was as close to Rogers as he could get, he’d text her.

Then Natasha would call Vance, and effectively get his go ahead to take over security in an attempt to stop Barton from running amok. The quarrel he’d had with Stark would help it appear as though team relations were fraying, and as long as Natasha just played dumb, there was no reason for him to believe she knew Steve was in the building. Once Natasha was armed and running freely through the premises, it was just a matter of acting and timing to get Steve out.

To fill the silence as she waited for Barton’s text, Natasha reached over to switch on the radio. At first, the caterwauling of country music filled the car, but Natasha switched it after just  moment.

_“-in, Stark has passed in a  91-8 vote. In a recent press statement, SI has said he intends to accept nomination. Moving remarkably fast, he will be sworn in on Thursday, the fifth of-”_

She glanced down as her phone buzzed. _Damn it, Clint._ She couldn’t stick around and listen to the announcement, which boded little good news.

_Pizza tonight? On me ;)_

“I’ll hold you to that, Barton,” she muttered sourly and gazed at her watch steadily for five minutes before she pressed dial. She began to jog towards the large Simone Group building in front of her.

It only rang twice before Vance picked up. _“I thought we agreed I was to contact you if I wished to discuss your future employment,”_ he snapped. Gone was the affable politician - here was someone all business.

“Change of plans,” Natasha said, deciding the harsh tone was better than the meek one. He wanted to pull a power play on her? Although he certainly wasn’t aware of it, she was happy to keep the upper hand. “Did Stark tell you about Barton?”

_“The archer who recruited you?”_

Natasha tilted her head slightly. Apparently, someone had either done a very thorough background check on her or someone was spilling secrets. Maybe a bit of both. Either way, Vance was clearly nervous. She could use that.

“That’s the one,” she confirmed. “I know he had a confrontation with Stark earlier - did he mention that to you? It looked ugly.”

 _“No, he didn’t mention anything of the sort,”_ there was a hard line in his voice, making his tones even colder than before. _“What is this about, Romanov?”_

She sped up her run, letting him hear her try to catch her breath although she could have kept up this pace for miles. Her words tripped over one another, broken up as she took in harsh gulps of air. “I’ve been trailing Barton since we spoke - he’d mentioned something about not being in contact with Rogers. I didn’t think anything of it until he said Stark punched him. Barton’s not acting rationally and-”

 _“What is the point of this, Romanov?”_ Vance had gone from angry to bored in a minute, even if he did sound slightly concerned.

She could build on that. “Like I said, I’ve been following him. Sometimes he pays me to-”

 _“To what?”_ Vance’s voice held a certain note of interest now.

“It doesn’t matter, sir. What matters is that he just walked into Simone a few minutes ago and hasn’t walked out. He left me a little tied up, so I wasn’t able to get free until now but-”

 _“What?”_ Vance tried to remain calm, but there was definitely a note of panic in his voice. _“He did what?”_

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” Natasha let a bit of a whine slip into her voice. “Barton walked into Simone - said something about a lead - and he hasn’t come out. I can find him - tell the guards to let me in.”

_“How the hell-”_

Natasha had timed it well; she burst through the door and went straight to the man checking ID’s in front of a revolving door. Like she’d expected, there was a large coffee stain down his shirt and a sour expression on his face.

“Let me through,” Natasha demanded. “You have a security leak.”

“Ma’am, I’m going to have-”

“You have an _Avenger_ in your building,” Natasha snapped. “I’m here to stop him from doing something stupid and screwing up things for the higher ups. Let me through.”

“I don’t have the auth-”

“Sir,” Natasha said into the phone, the perfect blend of desperation and need in her voice. “Can you tell this guard to let me in - if he lets me in now, I can get a unit to cut off Barton.”

 _“Give him the phone,”_ Vance said. There was something in his voice that made her almost regret this plan. She had caught him off-guard, and he was trying to put a bandaid on the situation as fast as possible.

Natasha promptly handed the guard the phone and watched all the blood drain out of his face. “I - uh, sir - ah, yes. Um, right away, I’m sorry, it won’t happen again and-”

He stared at the phone and slowly extended it to her. “If you’ll wait here a moment, I’ll summon guards for your disposal.”

“Hurry up,” Natasha said, then immediately sent him an apologetic look. “Sorry - I just didn’t think he was capable of this and I don’t want anyone getting shot because he’s a complete idiot.”

“Do you know how to find him?” the guard asked.

Natasha chewed on her lip. “He said something about… a shield? I don’t suppose you know anything about that.”

He shook his head. “No, ma’am, but the regular patrols might. They make rounds through the halls and tend to know a bit about where everything is. The higher-ups have no clue about half of the stuff the guards do.”

“That tends to be how it is, isn’t it?” Natasha asked, shaking her head. She leaned in slightly to him, lowering his voice. “I’m just hoping I can get this fixed in time, you know? I don’t want them using me for their tests.”

He made a disgruntled look. “I’ve heard rumors about-”

“Romanov!” the sharp call made Natasha turn. Three men in body armor approached her warily, their body language clearly ready for any sort of attack. Natasha gave them a small smile.

“Anything on the feeds?”

“Some sort of jammer - if I didn’t know better, I’d say it was Stark made.”

She’d have to ask Clint about that later.

“She said he might be looking for some sort of a shield,” the desk guard said. The two men in body armor who hadn’t spoken out exchanged similar looks.

“Third floor then,” the spokesperson said, unruffled. “You’ve been very helpful and Simone Groups appreciates your support. If you’ll-”

“I’m not waiting,” Natasha snapped. “Do you know what this guy is capable of? We need to move now before we lose him.”

Those were the magic words; the leader of the Simone goons nodded briskly. “Do you have a weapon?”

Natasha gave him a tight smile. “I’m armed.”

“Follow me and don’t get shot,” he clearly looked skeptical of her ability to follow directions, but Natasha nodded and fell in line. “We won’t trigger an alarm - if we can get him by surprise, it’ll be better for the rest of us.”

“I know his tricks,” Natasha said. _Even if you’re in the middle of one right now,_ she thought as she narrowed her eyes as someone peering out from their office. Upon seeing the obviously armed group, the worker ducked down.

They took the stairs - personally, Natasha would have gone for the elevator, gone a floor or two above Barton, and then worked her way down a less mainstream route. It was at the top of the flight of stairs that they found their first guard downed by a single arrow.

“Damn it,” the man muttered. “He already got up here.”

Hopefully Clint hadn’t stopped on the third floor - it was possible they were just trying to distract Natasha and keep her away from Steve while another group went after Clint. It would have been the smart thing, in her opinion, but it was entirely possible they hoped she’d be killed by her own team member.

“Down!” Natasha yelled, throwing herself flat as there was a crash from above them. Hoping it wasn’t too disastrous, Natasha peered around the edge of the stairs.

“Anything?” one of the guards who had remained silent up until this point asked.

“Must be above us. I don’t see anyone” Natasha muttered in reply, shifting as though she planned to stand. The guard who had just spoken gave her an exasperated look and stood.

Clint’s shot was an impressive one - it took the gunman straight through the throat. He fell with a gurgle, choking on his own blood.

“Barton! What’s wrong with you?” Natasha yelled.

Clint’s head poked up briefly, and Natasha sent off a shot that barely missed his ear. He gave her a wounded look that said _what did I ever do to you?_ “Natasha, I found-”

One of the men beside Natasha threw himself upright and started firing. Whatever Clint had been going to ‘say’ was lost as the bullets flew. It didn’t matter - Clint had started with the words that meant he’d found Steve, and just needed her to buy time. The archer disappeared, and there was complete silence as the man ran out of bullets.

“Let’s go kill him,” the second guy said, giving Natasha a sideways glance that he probably thought she’d missed.

“No,” Natasha snapped. She just needed to give Clint time to run and get Steve out. “We need a plan - fall back, get more men. Did you see that shooting? He could take down an army that way.”

As she spoke, she turned to creep a few steps up the stairs. When her back was turned, she slid out an arrow and palmed it in her hand. “Barton! I see you! What the hell is wrong with you?” she yelled to the empty air and then scrambled back down the steps.

The trigger happy guard crept past her, his gun already reloaded. Natasha slunk back a few steps and turned to the first guard.

“What do you think we-” she started to ask. She sent a quick glance to the second guard, who had fully turned his back, then in a swift moment jammed the arrow into the man she’d been talking to and let out a small scream.

She helped him fall, yelling out, “Did you see him? Why aren’t you shooting?”

There was a faint buzz in her pocket when her phone went off. She had it set up so that only Clint’s messages got through. Good, that meant he was almost out.

The guard made his way back to her, “I didn’t see anything!” he protested. Natasha gave him a look - he wasn’t the leader, so would probably be easy to influence.

“This is why you need me,” she snapped. “You are so incompetent - how on earth has this building stayed secure until now?”

“I-” the man cut himself off. “We need to call management and find this archer.”

 _“You_ call management,” Natasha snapped. She heard the sound of booted feet making their way up the stairs. Reinforcements, then. “I’ll get Barton before he escapes.”

“Uh...”

Apparently, the idea of making his own decisions was too much. Natasha gladly stomped all over any last remnants of resistance he had. “Go meet with them down there, I’m going to chase Barton.”

“I er-”

_“Now.”_

“Yes ma’am!”

The man scampered down the stairs in the opposite direction, and Natasha allowed herself a grim smile. Escort gone, she just needed to meet up with Clint and make sure Steve was fine. It had been rather pathetic, how easily led the men were. Still, better not be too arrogant as there was still time for the mission to go sideways.

She made her way quickly up the stairs, slipping through the fourth level door and running to where she saw a light on in the hallway. She turned the corridor, and came face to face with Clint’s bow.

“Hi,” she said, and he lowered it. Natasha took in his defensive posture, the blood staining his shirt and narrowed her eyes, giving him a quick once over. He’d taken the time to put on his climbing harness, and looked about as strained as she felt. “You hit?”

“Just a graze. You fine?” Clint jerked his head backwards, indicating something behind him. “How much time do we have?”

Natasha glanced down, realizing for the first time that the guard she’d killed had bled all over her shirt. “I’m fine. We don’t have long - I gave them the slip but for it to be convincing-”

“I need to be gone by the time they get here,” Clint said. “Give me a hand?”

Natasha looked in the direction where Clint had first indicated. Steve had been dumped against the wall, his glassy eyes staring through her. His expression was empty, and his dark civvies looked suspiciously damp.

Her heart skipped a bit. “He’s not-”

“No. Drugged, I think. His pulse is slow and he’s not reacting to anything.”

“Damn it,” Natasha grumbled. Now that she listened more closely, she could hear him wheezing faintly. They had done a number on him. “Give me your bow and I’ll help you get him off the ground.”

For the first time, she noticed the shield on Clint’s back. “I see you found yourself some armor,” she grinned.

Clint laughed. “Hopefully it’s not gotten too dinged up. There were a couple guards who didn’t really want to hand it over.”

“Brute force,” Natasha said in a disgusted tone as she took Clint’s bow and a few arrows. If she started filling guards with bulletholes, she’d instantly blow her cover. If she could take them out without being seen, then her identity would stay intact for a while longer. “Got him?”

Natasha walked over and leaned down, helping Clint haul Steve upright. Once Steve was slung at an uncomfortable looking angle on Clint’s shoulder, she took a step back. Clint grunted once he came under Steve’s full weight. “Okay, Captain America needs to lay off the Wheaties,” he said.

“Stop complaining,” Natasha said. “Is your harness secure?”

“Just need to get the window out. Give me an explosive arrow?” Clint asked.

Natasha listened carefully. They’d been left undisturbed for entirely too long. Quickly she handed him the requested arrow, takings a few more steps back. Clint stuck it to the side of the glass and stepped back as well. When she judged Clint to be at a safe distance, she pressed the button.

The glass blew outwards, luckily. Natasha pulled out a mirror and checked for any oncoming guards - only one man was in sight, creeping carefully down the hall. She pulled the bow to full draw, stepped out from under cover, and fired. The guard went down in a heap. Even if she wasn’t the natural shot Clint was, Natasha had spent a fair amount of time achieving basic proficiency. Her specialities lay elsewhere, but it had seemed common sense to make sure she could fire a weapon that was often near to hand.

It wasn’t like it was that difficult to shoot in a straight line, anyway.

“You did take out the security cameras, didn’t you?” she asked conversationally.

Clint paused. “...Yes.” He thought for a minute, then added, “I put it on a loop. You should be invisible to them.”

“I do have a cover to maintain, Agent Barton,” she grumbled at him, but there was no annoyance in her voice.

“River’s right below you,” she said, and froze as she heard the sound of clomping boots. “You need to hurry.”

“Stormtroopers’re coming,” Clint said. “I’m gunna jump.”

Clint’s escape plan had been simple enough; once he’d gotten Steve and the shield, he’d rappel down the side of the building as quickly as possible. Since the building backed right up to the river, if the men tried to shoot him down, he could just unclip himself and fall into the water. They’d estimated it to be deep enough in the center that if he kicked off from the building and leapt for it, the collision probably wouldn’t break his legs.

Natasha dropped his bow and arrow on the ground, jerking her head to the window. “Take your headstart,” she said.

Clint checked his climbing harness one more time, and Natasha tugged on the straps, making sure everything was secure before he climbed out the window.  With one arm, he kept Steve in place, while the other he grasped the clip that would let the rope out. He’d looped the end of the rope around the heavy lab table bolted to the floor in the middle of the room.

“I’ll meet you back where we’ve been staying. You owe me a pizza,” she added.

“Be careful. You better bring me back my bow,” Clint said, and then was gone, leaving behind only a steady hiss as his rope let out.

Natasha took a deep breath as the running footsteps got closer. It was time to sell her lie - that she’d missed Barton, and it was the fault of her lack of backup. She gathered her composure, slipping a mask in place, then ran out to meet the guards.

“He’s gone,” she said resolutely. They stopped short.

“What do you mean? You were supposed to stop him!” the lead one stepped forward.

“He tazed me,” she said, selling the lie with a slight wobble as she leaned on the wall. “I need to...see the rooms he hit. See if he took anything. It’s what Vance wants.”

They looked at each other, and one even stepped forward to catch her. She gave him an appreciative smile even as his leader spoke. “Absolutely not! How can we trust you?”

“I saved you all from getting killed, didn’t I?” she snapped. No one argued.

“Simmons, take her,” the leader snapped to the man that was still supporting her. “The rest of you, fan out. Clean up this mess.”

She gave Simmons an appreciative pat. “I’m fine,” she smiled sweetly, standing up. Simmons led her into the closest lab, which was a mess of shattered glass and equipment. There was a gurney with straps that had obviously been cut with a knife, as well as toppled IVs. She took out her phone, snapping a picture of the labels when Simmons’ back was turned.

“Do you know what this lab is for?” she asked.

“No, ma’am,” Simmons replied. He was staring at one of the needles on a table near the gurney. It was full but unused as far as she could tell. She went over and picked it up, making Simmons flinch. “I need to know what was in this.”

“Ma’am, I’m not entirely sure…”

“If Barton has taken some super soldier drug to make himself more powerful, I need to know about it _now_ ,” she growled.

The man nodded towards a cabinet against the wall. “I think there’s more in there.”

She moved over to the cabinet, hiding her grimace. There were enough small bottles of whatever it was (she glanced at the label again… B46_M18) to probably make a few gallons. She couldn’t destroy it here. For one, she didn’t know what it was, and two Simmons would be pretty suspicious of her randomly throwing about forty bottles of mystery drug onto the floor. She turned sharply, slipping one of the bottles into her pocket as she did so.

“Fine. Anywhere else?”

Simmons tilted his head, listening to the radio. “No, ma’am, this seems to be it.” As soon as he finished speaking, her phone rang. It was Vance.

 _“Well?”_ He asked.

“Barton escaped.”

_“Did he take anything?”_

“Not that I know of,” she said. “But I’ve only seen one lab.” She deliberately didn’t mention Steve. “I’m going to track him down.”

 _“Yes, that...that would probably be best,”_ he said.

“Yes, Sir.” She hung up the phone, not giving him a chance to plan anything. Without waiting for Simmons, she made her way to the lobby, sticking one of Stark’s transmitting devices on the desk as she passed by. She walked across the road and got into her car. As she turned onto an adjacent street, she saw a few people standing around with a police officer, presumably over a missing car.

She got to the motel room back in Virginia shortly after Clint did. Steve was on the bed, eyes still glassy and unmoving.

“How is he?” Natasha asked, throwing a glance at Steve.

Clint was in the middle of pacing their motel room. “No change, but stable. He’s healing pretty quickly, so I just cleaned what open wounds I could find,” he said, then added worriedly, “I gotta dump this car.”

“Go,” she told him, and couldn’t help but glance at Steve again. Clint had throw a blanket over him, at least, but underneath she could see Steve’s bloodstained clothes. If Clint had taken care of him, she’d focus on doing some more digging. She opened her laptop and connected with Deep Net Dude, the bottles weighing on her mind.

_What’s B46_M18?_

She tapped her fingers quickly on the armrest, glancing towards Steve. He was breathing slowly. She glanced at the pictures she took earlier of the IV bags. She’d seen it before - it was a heavy sedative, one used more with animals than with humans. It shouldn’t hurt him, but it was impressive and worrisome that it was strong enough to work on Steve for so long.

Her laptop dinged.

_It’s a drug that makes someone extremely prone to suggestion. Bordering on brainwashing._

Natasha felt a chill run through her. It was too strong a correlation to be anything as benign as a coincidence. As most of her team well knew, anything related to the Red Room was enough to get Natasha anxious. In combination with Steve’s temporary disappearance, it was too much for her to dismiss.

_Have they used human trials?_

_Yes. But I don’t know the details._

She stood up slowly, moving over to the bed. “Steve,” she said quietly. Still nothing. She moved a hand slowly to his forehead. Still nothing.

She didn’t think they had used the drug on him, but it still worried her. Although she had joked about the corruption of Captain America being a Soviet dream, her comment hadn’t been too far off the mark. Hopefully, Steve would wake shortly and everything would be fine.

Clint came back shortly, out of breath. “How is he?”

“No change,” she said. “But our problem may be worse than we thought.” She turned the laptop towards him, and waited while he read the dialogue.

“That’s…did they use it on him?” Clint’s face went pale, and he gnawed at his lip.

“I don’t think so. None of the bottles were open, just the sedative.”

She saw Clint breathe a shaky sigh of relief. “That’s...good. That’s good then, they didn’t use it on him.” He ran a hand through his hair and paced across the room.

Natasha couldn’t blame him for pacing, even if it did make her want to fidget. “I left a backdoor to go through their systems, so we can probably look through the videos and see if-”

She was interrupted as Steve sucked in a breath, and let out a single cough. Both Natasha and Clint rushed to his side, the video forgotten. “Steve?”

He winced, bringing a hand to his forehead. “What happened?”

“You were taken by the Simone Group from your apartment. Then they moved you to a research facility.” Natasha put two fingers on his wrist, feeling his pulse. It was strong and steady, almost to normal.

“I remember getting ambushed in my apartment,” he groaned. “But not that other thing...who took me?”

“The Simone Group,” Clint repeated, sitting down on the end of the bed. “Short term memory loss isn’t uncommon with sedatives.”

Steve opened his eyes and took in the two of them. “You both saved me?” he asked. Then he noticed the blood and black eyes. “Are you alright?”

“The blood’s not ours and the black eye’s from Stark,” Clint grumbled.

“Stark?” Steve said, even more confused.

Natasha went back to the chair that had her laptop. “We have a lot to fill you in on,” she started. She opened the feed on the bug she’d left at Simone Group. “For one, you’ve been missing for the better part of two days. Then Clint got punched in the face by Stark.”

“And Natasha works for the bad guy that’s leading Stark’s campaign,” Clint added helpfully.

“Well, probably not anymore,” she said, opening the feed. She cycled through until she found the cameras in the lab where Steve had been found, and began rewinding them all. She moved over to the bed, sitting down so Steve wouldn’t need to stand up. Clint grabbed a chair and grabbed it across the floor, the legs thumping as they caught on the carpet.

“You do give me the best presents,” Clint joked. “Brainwashing drugs and all.”

“Drugs?” Given his current, flat-on-the-bed state, Natasha couldn’t blame Steve for this current alarm. “I think I’ve missed something.”

“Clint and I have been in contact with someone that works for the Simone Group - the group that orchestrated your kidnapping. He’s the one that alerted us when you were brought into the building,” Natasha said slowly, and gestured to Clint. Clint heaved himself out of the chair and went to grab one of the vials on the desk.

“B46_M18,” she announced. “Sound familiar?”

Steve winced as he reached out, and Clint handed him the small bottle. After reading the label, he glanced at Natasha. “This is the same as we found-”

“Yes,” Natasha said. Clint cast her a curious look, and she elaborated. “In the Red Room cell we sorted out in Munich. Close to where they kept their prisoners, we found a supply full of these with identical labels - the handwriting’s even the same.”

“So we have the Simone Group, an American biochemical engineering research group that manufactures chemical weapons, and does shady underhanded dealings with politicians… and you’re saying they’re affiliated with the Red Room?” Clint summed it up. Steve was starting to look more worried and more confused.

She glanced over to meet Steve’s eyes, grimacing at him and saying, almost apologetically, “I think they are Red Room.”

There was flat silence, and Clint swore loudly. Steve pulled himself to a more upright sitting position, glancing back down at the vial in his hand. “Why?” was all he asked.

Natasha pressed play on the camera, and Clint craned over her shoulder. She made sure Steve got a good line of vision. There was no sound, but there didn’t need to be.

The first subject was a woman, late thirties. She shuffled into the room, moving exactly where they prodded her to as they strapped her into the table. The second they inserted an IV into her arm, she began to thrash and scream, terror erupting across her face.

Natasha glanced back up as they brought a balding man into the room.

“The techniques… they’re sloppy. Less refined than Munich’s, which would make sense if they’re a group recruited and trained locally. It also explains the poor quality of the guards. Identical chemicals in both locations - my guess is that Munich’s been sending them their subjects and they’ve been sending their trials back.”

“But why Red Room?” Steve repeated.

“They’re posed to sign a government deal to manufacture weapons worse than what Stark used to give the US. Chemical, bio - I’m sure they had nukes as well. Once their weapons are in place…”

Clint snapped his fingers and said, “Boom.”

“War on the US. What I don’t understand is where Vance comes to this. He doesn’t seem like Red Room material to me - he wants power, not to support a cause. There’s also the nomination with -”

“Holy shit,” Clint said. Natasha glanced back at him - his eyes were fixed on the video feed that was still playing. She followed his gaze, and it was like the floor dropped out from under her. “Holy shit, they have Stark.”

On the video, Stark struggled against his restraints, yelling abuse at his captors. Natasha looked up to meet Steve’s gaze. “He’s being installed as Secretary of Defense in two days.”

Steve’s eyes flickered between her and Clint. “Who attends the swearing in?”

“VP, some of the other Secretaries. Sometimes even the President,” Clint said slowly. “Fuck.”

“Forget war on the US,” Steve said, and looked down at the drug in his hand. “With everyone gathered around Stark and with the drug...”

“Stark might be the bomb that goes off,” Natasha confirmed. “He’d be in the perfect place for it. He could even survive, if he got his suit to him in time.”

“What do we do?” Clint demanded.

“We protect our own,” Steve replied. “Get Stark free of the programming and we can stop whatever they have planned.”

“And if we can’t?” Natasha asked. Steve broke eye contact with her, glancing away. Clint paused the video of Stark thrashing against the needle in his arm.

“We will,” Clint said, even if there was a note of panic in his voice. “You broke through Loki’s power. I got through to you and I didn’t even know you. Peggy Carter got to Howard Stark. Selvig helped you break the portal after running around playing fetch for Loki. Uhh, who else do we know that’s been mind controlled?”

“Bucky broke through,” Steve replied. “But.. he had a good reason to.”

“That was after punching you in the face a few times, right? We already have a head start there,” Clint continued, gesturing todays his eye.

“We’re his team,” Steve said firmly, as though Clint had tossed him a lifeline.

Natasha stiffened, thinking of her conversation just hours ago with Clint. _Maybe he doesn’t think of us as his team,_ she’d told him. She wasn’t sure if she’d ever hoped this desperately to be wrong before.

“We’ll do what it takes,” Natasha said quietly, and both Steve and Clint fell silent. She grabbed the bottle of chemicals from Steve’s hand, suddenly feeling claustrophobic. “I’m going to see if I can get my informant to do some more digging. We need to get Stark free before it’s too late.”

 _Before I’m forced to stop him,_ Natasha didn’t say.

“Welcome back to the land of the living,” Clint said to Steve as she picked up her laptop and bag and walked from the room. The door swung shut on his last words. “I hope you don’t mind how utterly fucked we are.”

 


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is it. Thanks so much for reading and leaving comments and kudos.

Steve left to drive to Tony’s townhouse. His intention was to talk to him. Or kidnap him. Probably some combination.

Clint contacted anyone and everyone he knew with any sort of White House knowledge. Clint kept grumbling about guys that just hopped the fence and were inside. Natasha was of half a mind to try it.

Natasha herself contacted Deep Net Dude, asking him for any and all information about B46_M18.

 _You’ve probably figured out by now who we are,_ she said by way of greeting.

_I have. Which is why I’m pretty sure I did the right thing._

_Just “pretty sure”? If you’re interested, I can probably get you a new job at S.I. when this all blows over. But I need some more information._

_Deal. What do you need?_

_Every file you have on B46_M18. Also anything else you know about it. Our teammate was subjected to it._

_Shit. Iron Man?_

_I’d appreciate if you kept this quiet and just told me what I needed to know. Please._

Half a minute later, her email pinged with a new zip file from an anonymous source.

_There’s a drug to counter the effects, but I’m not sure a physical copy exists here. The formula’s in that file. Be careful, it does have detox-like effects._

She grimaced, opening a blank email. They’d have to move fast. She forwarded the page to Bruce, with a quick note.

 _What about breaking the programming in person?_ She asked Deepnet Dude.

_Maybe? It won’t be 100% effective. It’s possible your friend has had long term exposure almost every day since he’s been nominated. It could be difficult._

She thought back to the emails they’d pulled from Stark’s hard drive. The almost daily meetings and how Stark never declined.

She felt sick. How could something like this happen right under their noses? With all of their experience? But then she remembered how easily Clint had gotten the information. It should have been all but impossible to break through Tony’s encryptions.

“He left them for us,” she swiveled her head towards Clint.

“Huh?” He looked up from a tablet that had floor plans on it.

“Stark. He wanted us to find those emails. We just didn’t...I didn’t think…” Her fists clenched in frustration.

“Nat, it’s not your fault. None of us picked up on it. We’ll get him back.” Clint was quiet, worried.

She nodded, closing her eyes. She inhaled deeply, with a calmness she didn’t truly feel.

Her phone rang a moment later and she grabbed it.

 _“He’s not here,”_ Steve said, voice betraying the frustration he felt. _“The house is abandoned. There’s not even furniture.”_

“Vance is on to us. Security is going to be beefed up big time.”

 _“We may still have the upper hand,”_ Steve said, and she put him on speaker so Clint could hear. _“He can’t tell the President they have to be on the lookout for three Avengers, one of whom is Captain America. He’ll never believe it.”_

“Ah, Steve’s finally taking advantage of his name brand,” Clint said lightly.

“Are you saying we just walk in the front door?” Natasha asked.

_“Well, maybe not…”_

“I have a contact that works in the Treasury. He can get us through the gate,” Clint said. “From there, it’s a quick Hidden Marilyn Monroe Tunnel next door to 1600 Penn.”

_“Good, I’m on my way back then. Natasha, what do you have?”_

She didn’t tell Steve about the emails. She couldn’t, not yet. “I have a formula for a counter-drug that I sent to Bruce.”

_“That’s not going to be enough.”_

“I know!” She snapped. Clint regarded her silently. “Sorry, it’s just...well, it might be possible to at least talk him down or something, but the drug won’t be fully out of his system without the counter-drug.”

_“Understood. I’ll be back soon, we can talk about it more then.”_

He hung up, and took her phone back. She opened a new message to Pepper.

_Whatever you hear in the next few days, you have to stay in New York. Don’t answer any questions until we can debrief you._

The reply from Pepper was almost immediate.

_What the hell is happening? What’s Tony doing? I haven’t heard from him in days!_

_Please, trust me. I can’t tell you right now but we’re keeping your best interests at heart._

_Natasha, I’ve been patient with you before, but I need answers. Sooner rather than later._

“Ouch I just got hit by CEO Potts,” she mumbled to Clint.

“Better bow out, I don’t think even you can win that one,” he mumbled.

 _Tony’s in trouble. That’s all I can tell you. But we’re going to sa-_ she bit her lip, then deleted the last sentence. _We’ll help him. Please stay in New York, it could put us all in more danger if you come here._

_Don’t disappoint me._

Natasha winced. She hated making Pepper angry, and she forgot how uncomfortable it could be to have that anger aimed at her.

She opened up a new text message to Bruce next. _Come to DC right away. Tony’s in danger. Also maybe the Western World. Check your email._  

“That should get his attention,” she mumbled.

Her phone rang again, and she raised an eyebrow. “It’s Vance,” she said to Clint.

“Ooh, put it on speaker.”

She did, laying the phone on the floor between them. “Vance.”

 _“You’re dead, do you hear me? No one betrays me and gets away with it.”_ His voice had a tone of barely controlled rage.

“I’m a spy, it’s kind of what I do,” she said. Clint shot her a wide-eyed look of appreciation.

 _“You bitch,”_ he snarled.

She cut him off. “I’m going to find out what you’re up to,” she lied. “I know it’s bigger than Rogers.”

 _“You’ll be dead before you can leave Fairfax County,”_ he snarled.

“A Congressman threatening to murder an Avenger? I doubt that’ll go over well with your Super PAC.”

_“No one will believe you. I’ve got my hand in too many coffers.”_

“Care to wager? I’m sure the Senatorial Oversight Committee will love a copy of this conversation.”

The line clicked off.

“Heh,” Clint said. Then doing his best Trump impression (which wasn’t good by any means) said “You’re fired.”

“He’ll probably figure out we know about Stark too, sooner than later. Just make sure we have backups of all of this stuff to get his ass in court later.”

“Already on it,” Clint said, continuing to type on the laptop. Natasha sat back, listening to the clack of his keys in the quiet room.

“What time is Stark being sworn in?” she asked.

There was a pause as Clint’s typing faltered. “Morning. Elevenish, it looks like.” They were running out of time. They needed Banner to come to DC, they needed Stark to break whatever programming they’d put him under, they needed to avert a catastrophe that would upend the U.S. Government, they needed, they needed, they needed...

They needed a plan.

When Steve got back, they put their heads together and by the end of the night, they had one.

* * *

 

Steve was always a fan of the direct approach, no matter how they tried to talk him out of it. They waited with hordes of people outside the gates the morning of the swearing in. Some had posters praising Iron Man. Just as many had posters condemning him.

Natasha and Clint blended easily into the crowd, but Steve parked himself right up next to the barricade. When the motorcade rolled up about half an hour before the swearing in ceremony, Natasha watched as Steve stood up proudly. He was wearing his uniform under a large jacket. Enough people recognized him that a small halo of space and wonder had formed around him.

The limo in the middle pulled up and stopped right in front of him.

Natasha moved closer to hear what was happening.

“Cap. Come for my swearing in? Or are you about to head over to the CNN Washington office to crap on me some more?”

Tony was wearing dark sunglasses, but Natasha could still see how haggard his face looked. Even though he seemed to be himself, Natasha tensed with the knowledge that he’d probably had a pretty hard dose of the chemicals recently.

Steve seemed to notice it too, and his face softened.

“Tony. These people are hurting you. Would you come with me willingly? Please?”

Vance’s head appeared in the window along with Tony’s. Tony, for his part, shrunk out of the way obediently.

“Captain Rogers, you _don’t_ want to cause a scene,” he said, nodding towards the cameras that were also in the crowd.

Natasha saw Steve’s jaw clench. “I know what you did to him. What you tried to do to me. It’s unforgivable.”

“Careful,” Vance sneered. “The press already thinks you’re jealous of Mr. Stark’s job. Don’t want to add fuel to the ‘Captain America’s a Fascist’ fire, now do you?”

“You won’t get away with this,” Steve growled. “Tony, please,” Steve implored again, looking back to Tony.

Tony’s brow knit in confusion before Vance leaned over and whispered something in his ear. Tony blinked, then gave a fake smile to Steve. “See you later, Cap.” The window rolled up, and then a secret service member was between Steve and the car.

“Sir, I’m sorry, but you’ll have to leave.”

Steve put his hands up in apparent surrender as the motorcade rolled away. He backed away into the crowd.

Natasha met up with both him and Clint further from the fence. “I think I’m gonna kill that guy,” Clint growled. Natasha saw how his knuckles were almost white where they clutched his bow case.

“He’ll face justice,” Steve said quietly. “And Tony’s not so far gone. We can get to him, I know it.”

Clint’s grip loosened, and he nodded. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone.

“Greg? Hey,” he said easily into. He started walking across the street until they were in front of the guardhouse for the Treasury Building. “How about giving us the tour?”

Ten Minutes and a few security checks later, and they were inside. Clint’s friend Greg seemed to be a pencil-pusher type, who was happily talking about the architecture in the building. They smiled along pleasantly, until they came to an abandoned office in the hallway. Natasha looked around quickly to make sure they were alone, before she pushed Greg into it.

“Hey, what-”

“Sorry,” Clint shrugged. “But we’re in a hurry, and this is a matter of National Security, trust me.” Natasha quickly gagged Greg with his own neck tie, and put some plastic zip-ties on his wrists and ankles before depositing him behind a desk. “I owe you one, buddy. Coffee’s on me next time I see you!”

Greg shouted something, but it was muffled. Natasha took his ID badge, and they went back into the hallway, closing the door behind them.

“This way.” Clint walked briskly to the nearest stairwell with the two of them following. The stairs led to a basement level which seemed to be abandoned. No one was down there, and instead of fancy offices, the place resembled more of an abandoned bunker. They quickly shrugged out of their clothes covering their uniforms, and Clint opened the weapons case that contained his bow and guns for all of them. They also contained Natasha’s new favorite toys, her shock sticks. Unfortunately, Steve couldn’t have smuggled his shield in, but he took the gun and assembled it easily.

“How’d you guys get all of this through security?” Steve asked, impressed.

“A lady never tells,” Clint answered.

Clint led them to a set of doors that led outside. When they opened them, they were below street level, in a kind of alleyway. About ten feet away were two more doors which led to the basement of the White House.

“Taa-daa,” Clint grinned.

“Time to go get our Iron Man.” Natasha’s shock sticks came to life with a crackle of electricity. She twirled one of them idly, checking the weight and balance until it settled comfortably into her grasp.

“Sounds like my type of plan,” Clint said with a grin. “I’ve always wanted to break into the White House.”

“Don’t take any detours,” Natasha warned. “I know you’ve heard the reputation of the kitchen here.”

“Have I ever been anything less than professional?” Clint demanded. Steve made a vaguely choked noise. “Quiet in the peanut gallery. I don’t care what your birth record says, I’ve spent more time conscious than you have.”

Natasha laughed quietly, even as Steve braced himself against the door. “Once we’re through, there’s no turning back,” Steve warned.

“ _You’re_ the one that led unauthorized rescue missions into enemy territory,” Clint said. “One would think you weren’t too concerned about this type of thing.”

“That was for Bucky,” Steve replied, and Natasha watched the way he coiled like a spring about to be let loose. “Bucky and a whole lotta people who didn’t deserve to be Hydra experiments.”

“This is for Tony,” she told them both. Clint and Steve both looked at her, and Steve nodded.

“Fair enough,” he agreed.

“Let’s not forget the top tier of the US government,” Clint added as Steve took several steps back before he threw his weight against the first locked door.

It broke surprisingly easily, perhaps no defense against a determined super soldier. Maybe Natasha would have been more worried if it weren’t for the circumstances, maybe not. There weren’t many people out there with the blunt force Steve possessed or the guile Natasha and Clint wielded.

“ Well, this is promising,” Clint said, offering Steve a hand up. Steve picked himself up off the floor, rubbing his shoulder. “Round two?”

“They’ll probably hear this one,” Natasha warned. “Be ready.”

Steve measured the door, leaning forward to the front of his feet. “Well, you _did_ make me the distraction,” he pointed out genially.

Natasha patted him on the shoulder. “And such a good one you make,” she said.

“If it makes you feel better,” Clint said woefully. “She turned me over to Vance just two days ago.”

Natasha huffed, lowering herself as she prepared to dash forward. “ _Honestly_ , Barton. You take everything so personally.”

Breaking into the White House shouldn’t have been as easy as it was. Or at least, as easy as it was in the beginning.

 _“Isn’t there, like, supposed to be Secret Service?”_ Clint asked casually over the comms. as Natasha made her way down the hall. They’d separated upon entry, each of the three going their separate ways.

Natasha, in midfight, rolled her eyes. One of the two men she was fighting with hesitated at the expression, and she took the opportunity to kick the other one in the face. She sprung forward with a growl, and rather than face her, he broke and ran.

“Amateurs,” she muttered, stepping over the body of the man she’d most recently taken down. By the direction the other was running, he’d probably run into Steve long before he was able to raise an alarm.

 _“What?”_ Barton said.

“Either Secret Service has gotten sloppy, or Vance has brought in his own guys,” Natasha mused. “It’s easier on us, either way.”

She heard Clint whistle quietly to himself, and she sighed. “Rogers? How are you doing?”

 _“You sure about this?”_ Steve asked a little more uncertainly than she’d have liked.

“You’ll be fine, team leader,” she laughed quietly, sidestepping the body that threw itself at her as she made her way down the hallway. Natasha didn’t bother wrestling him into submission, as that ending would have been a foregone conclusion anyway. When he slid into a fighting stance, Natasha mirrored him. The man - tall, looked more like a bodybuilder than a desk jockey - raised his fists and charged again.

She sidestepped, and this time whacked him in the back with one of her batons. It lit up with energy, and he dropped like a stone. Natasha made a face and stepped over his prone body.

 _“Either we are way too good, or Vance really needs better hired help,”_ Clint muttered.

Natasha glanced back at the trail of bodies behind her. It wasn’t more than a handful, but it was enough to make her doubt how easily they were carving through the rank and file members. “I thought this would be a _real_ challenge,” she said, a trifle sourly. If she were right, the sheer amount of bodies in the hallway she’d chosen meant she was heading in the right direction. If not, Clint was going to be having another happy reunion with Stark.

 _“Found Vance,”_ Steve said quietly.

“Bystanders?”

 _“Few guards. The cabinet can’t be more than  few rooms away - he’s heading straight towards me._ ”

Which meant, if he continued, he’d run right into Natasha. Natasha crossed into the next ornate room, sparing a glance for the painting of what was probably some American icon. If a bomb _did_ end up going off today, the loss of that artwork wouldn’t be a tragedy.

The distraction, surprisingly, proved useful. Natasha’s hesitation caused her to idle at the side of the room, which was perhaps why Tony Stark walked entirely into the room and was halfway to the door Natasha had entered by before he registered her presence.

Luckily she’d locked the door behind her, which meant she only needed to beat Stark to the other exit. She didn’t even bother going that far - as soon as Stark saw her, he turned and looked like he was preparing to run. Natasha made a few quick steps forward and grasped his wrist.

“ _Tony,_ ” she said quietly, and he struggled against her. Natasha cast a quick glance at the slightly ajar door, hoping no one was close enough to hear their scuffle. “ _Tony,_ we’re trying to help you.”

He tugged against her, taking a step back, and made a half-aborted motion that caused Natasha to flinch despite herself. She wasn’t sure who was more surprised when his suit didn’t come to him after he hissed, _“Jarvis!”_

His eyes were wide, as foggy as they were frantic, and it was as though he was reacting on a delayed timer. As Natasha reached to grab his other wrist, he tried to move sluggishly away from her.

Was he fighting it? She couldn’t tell if he was so far gone all his reactions were dulled, or if his sporadic movements were from his natural stubbornness fighting his new programming.

When Natasha was a girl, they’d had a lifetime to work on her. She still was learning which cues and triggers they had left in her, and it would probably take another lifetime to fully break free. With Tony, they’d had… months? Weeks? At this point she didn’t even know.

He tried to kick her knee and Natasha twisted away. She used her dodge to accelerate her momentum, causing Tony to hit the ground. She straddled his chest, one stun stick crossing his throat. If he tried to surge up against her or struggle, it would crackle to life at the sudden pressure and leave him unconscious.

“ _Leaving right before the swearing-in? Romanov told me you’d try that,”_ Steve’s voice burst in through the comms.. Natasha smiled despite herself. It was about time someone dealt with Vance beside her.

“ _Miss Romanov knows nothing,”_ Vance’s voice came faintly in reply. Natasha could imagine them now - glaring daggers at each other but forced to physically play nice because of the proximity of president and, likely, the most loyal members of the Secret Service. _“She doesn’t know how deep our infiltration goes.”_

 _“You tried to trigger her, didn’t you?”_ Steve asked suddenly. Natasha stiffened despite herself, and under her, Tony made a slight choking noise as her baton pressed further into his throat. She eased up on the pressure somewhat. _“That’s why you believed her so readily.”_

_“I don’t know-”_

Natasha spoke over the sound of Steve and Vance’s chatter. “It’s neither here nor there, how long they’ve been working on you,” she said aloud, as though she could defy her earlier thoughts. “You don’t want to lose to your father, do you? We heard stories about how he shook off the Room’s yoke before it was too late. _Howard Stark, American hero -_ that’s what they said, the day we discussed him in class. We hated him for it.”

Tony mouth moved in what might have been a grimace, “You’re weak, Romanov,” he said, and it surprised her how they’d ever mistaken this sad, confused pretender for their Stark. “You don’t realize the power I’m going to give all the superheroes - not just the team. I’ll have the power to save our country and I’ll be the most effective Secretary in decades. With Vance behind me-”

She adjusted her weight, aware he was trying to find some weak point. She had all her leverage on him, her weight settled squarely so that it would be truly impressive if he squirmed free. “With Vance behind you?” she demanded. “What about your team? You’ll _save our country?_ At what cost?”

“Whatever it takes,” he said, but there was confusion in his eyes as he stared up at her. _Damn it, Tony._

 _“Get Vance to step closer,”_ Clint said. _“I have a good sight on you, but he’s not in my line of vision.”_

“Hold your fire,” Natasha ordered. As she shifted once more, her knee bumped against the bag Tony had been carrying. Warily, she jerked her head. “You’re not talking like the Tony Stark we hate to love,” she said. “What happened to the Iron Man that flew a nuke into another galaxy?”

“Can’t you see?” he replied. “No suit. Jarvis hasn’t been happy with me, and I can’t get around his programming.”

“Take away the suit and what are you?” Natasha asked quietly. Tony jerked under her, his muscles tensing despite themselves. She glanced sideways, at the bag. “A figurehead that’s going to rely on Vance to make his policies?”

“I was someone else before Iron Man,” Tony replied, and tried to buck her free. He dislodged her enough to make a grab for his bag, and Natasha snatched it away as he tried to hit her with it.

“And what are you after it?” Natasha snarled, and glanced inside the bag. A chill ran through her. “How did you get this in here?”

 _“It doesn’t matter if you break Stark’s programming,”_ Vince was telling Steve. _“He won’t make it out.”_

 _“Got him,”_ Clint hissed. “ _Do I take it?”_

 _“What do you mean?”_ Steve demanded, the uneasy edge to his voice causing Natasha to narrow her eyes.

Tony didn’t answer her, and Natasha placed her elbow onto the scar tissue where the arc reactor once was. To her surprise, something harder and cooler than bone met her touch.

“Tony?” she asked slowly.

 _“It’s remarkable what you can do as the future Secretary of Defense,”_ Vance said, the smug tone reminding Natasha of her own trainers when they were sure she was about to fail.

“I’m going to save the country,” Stark said, sounding dazed.

“Don’t shoot,” Natasha said quickly. “Stark - he’s wired to a bomb. Look like there’s some chemical in his bag..”

 _“Like walk through security checkpoints?”_ Steve asked slowly.

“ _There’s a group coming your way, Steve,”_ Clint said.

 _“Natasha,”_ Steve’s voice came over the comms, resolute. _“Do...what you have to.”_

“I’m sorry,” Tony said, baring his teeth like the words pained him. “Tried...not to fuck up. Did anyway.” His last words were pushed out in a rush and he sucked in another lungful of air.

“Self-pity later,” she growled, hauling him up. He threw a right hook at her when she did, but it was weak, like a puppet whose strings had all been cut. She blocked it easily and pulled him along with his bag towards the door.

 _“The President flew the coop. Just the regulars left,”_ Clint reported.

 _“Vance, tell me how to disarm the bomb. A lot of people can still walk away from this, you included,”_ She heard Steve say.

She pulled Tony through the doorway, searching frantically for an exit. She spotted a door that led to the lawn and she yanked Tony towards it. She readied one of her batons, ready to smash through it, but was interrupted by a weight plowing into her back. She let out a whuff as Stark fell into her. He pinned her to the ground with a savagery he had lacked just seconds before, and put his bag over the back of her head.

 _“You won’t stop it,”_ she vaguely heard Vance reply. _“I may have failed, but I’m taking you all down with me.”_ Natasha twisted her hips before Tony could sit on her lower back. She brought her top leg forward, then extended it in a vicious kick right to Tony’s jaw. He cried out and fell back, leaving Natasha free to scramble out from under him. She pulled him upright again. He followed but was clutching his jaw. The fight seemed to leak out of him again.

She smashed the windows and pulled him out onto the lawn. All the secret service agents seem to have gone inside, because they were alone.

“We’re clear of the building,” she panted. She turned around and hooked her leg behind Stark’s knee, effectively dropping him to the ground. She leaned down and tore his shirt open, getting her first look at the timer taped to his chest. She couldn’t cut the tape because there were wires wrapped in thick casing, so thick they were almost cables, wrapped around his torso. More wires ran from his chest and disappeared into his sleeve, emerging again where they were attached to the bag.

 _“You’re out of time,”_ she heard Vance say with an air of smug satisfaction.

_“NATASHA!”_

She wasn’t sure who shouted. She was focused on the clock which said they had six seconds.

There was an electronic whine as she charged her baton to full power.

“Here goes,” she whispered.

Four seconds left and she lowered the baton to the timer. It sizzled and Stark screamed and there was a smell of melting metal and wires, and Steve was shouting at her, and she felt her own hair standing on end.

But then the timer fizzled and died. Stark collapsed, moaning, the bomb smoking. But it hadn’t exploded.

She collapsed onto her rear in the grass, breathing heavily, sweat running down her face. “All clear,” she panted.

* * *

 

Four days later, Natasha was parked in a hospital chair trawling the Internet for relevant news when Sam’s picture popped up on her screen.

For a moment, she just stared at the picture of Sam giving her a thumbs up, then she hit accept call.

“You were averting national - hell, _international_ \- disaster in DC and you didn’t tell me?” he demanded loudly. Natasha plugged in her headphones and sat back, a smile spreading over her face despite her best attempts to stop it.

“Well, soldier,” she began slowly, the words twining around themselves.

Sam knew her well enough by now not to be thrown by any attempts at flirtation. “That’s like, my home turf,” he said, and his tone strayed towards wounded. “I thought we agreed the first time that you super soldiers would let us ordinary fellows-”

Natasha laughed softly, glancing at the bed beside her. “Try calling yourself an ordinary fellow again. I dare you. Not just anyone can fly wings the way you do. Even Stark does it in a metal tin can.”

Sam harrumphed at her. “Exactly! What were you doing saving the entire cabinet without me?”

Natasha drummed her fingers, thinking back to the last frantic days. Her gaze travelled across the room, and landed on Tony again. “I’m sorry,” she said, a little of her own frustration bleeding into her voice. “It’s just been-”

“You okay?” Sam asked, instantly switching tracks. “You might not like to admit it, but-”

“I’m closer to Stark than I should be?” she finished for him. “I just… what did you hear on the news?”

“Not much,” Sam hedged. “The base details - something about a Russian sleeper cell trying to use chemical warfare during Stark’s swearing in. All the news feeds cut off right before the ceremony, and the next thing the public heard was that Stark had changed his mind after all.”

“We spoke to Ellis and he agreed that was probably the best version to go out,” Natasha said. “Tony… they’d used a serum-”

“Super soldier?” Sam cut in, voice going frantic.

“Nothing like that. One of the old espionage legends - mind control.”

Sam laughed, but fell silent after a moment. “You serious?”

“Wish I wasn’t,” she admitted. She snuck another glance at Tony - just as still as he’d been for the past several days - and sighed. “It was… close,” she said reluctantly.

“Close as in, the Winter Soldier and Steve using each other as punching bags close or…”

“I dragged Tony out of the building and almost killed us both trying to stop the chemical bomb on his chest from going off,” Natasha said in a rush. “Clint was ready to shoot him… and I said no.”

It scared her, more than she wanted to admit. It scared her to think about the fact that between the mission and her teammates, she was more than ready to choose her teammates.

To her surprise, Sam laughed again. “Congratulations, Natasha. You’re human.”

She scowled. “Very funny.”

“Well, _I_ like to think I am,” was his glib reply.

Natasha paused, watching Tony shift a little on the bed. “You know why we didn’t call you?” she said.

“Oh?”

“Action figure set would have been too expensive - they’d have to make those wings look authentic, after all, not the cheap toys they look like in real life,” she said. “I’ll talk to you later, I think Tony’s waking up.”

She hung up on Sam’s chuckle, leaning back in her seat and pulling up Angry Birds on her phone. She counted Tony’s slow, even breaths, listening for the spike as he realized he was awake and restrained.

“You’re fine,” she said quietly, leaning forward. “Pepper’s going to be back in a few minutes, but I didn’t want you to wake up without knowing what was going on.”

He turned his head to look at her, still struggling to wakefulness. Good, better talk before he started running his mouth.

“I don’t know how much you remember,” she continued. “Bruce used the formula I sent him to try to clear the last of the drugs from your system. You’re going to be having some withdrawal symptoms for a while - probably some tremors, headaches, but most of it’s been washed from your system. You’ll probably have to lay off the alcohol, between what the hospital’s given you and the fact that this hasn’t been tested.”

Tony rolled his eyes - at least the _no alcohol_ part had gotten clear across to him.

“The public doesn’t know that you were involved in the attempted attack. We put you under pretty quickly after, you were resisting us after Clint shot Vance. We weren’t sure what affects his death would cause, so we knocked you out. We woke you up to run some tests, and you were pretty out of it. Pepper signed off on everything before we tried to treat you. Steve’s doing some press tours, assuring everyone that the Avengers are fine.”

Briefly, she debated whether or not to tell him about the discussion they’d had after Ellis had shied from Tony actually getting Secretary of Defense after the fiasco. “We found a video of you refusing the nomination - Jarvis had been ordered to keep it hidden, but Pepper got it out of him. It seems that you tore apart some of his programming to try to get back into your suits - apparently, you wrote in a failsafe once Barnes came out and Jarvis could subvert some of your commands under the programming.”

The door swung open as Pepper walked in, summoned by Natasha’s text. Natasha met her eyes, and smiled.

“How is he?” she asked, looking at Natasha rather than at Tony.

Slowly, Tony pulled the fingers of one hand into a thumbs up towards Pepper. When Pepper looked back at Natasha, he raised his middle finger at the latter.

“Just… peachy,” he said, croaking somewhat. “Someone got some ice cubes?”

“He’ll be fine,” Natasha said. It was as though she’d shed a weight; Natasha stood up, sliding her phone into her back pocket. “I need to go, but I’ll be back for visiting hours tomorrow.”

She pulled Pepper into a hug, and returned Stark’s earlier gesture. He stuck his tongue out at her. Natasha was almost to the door when he croaked out her name.

“Roma- Natasha?” she turned, half in, half out of the doorway. “Thanks.”

Natasha met his eyes steadily, tilting her head to one side. “For what?” she said innocently and swept out of the door, passing two doctors as she did so.

* * *

 

Clint had pulled the car around the curb by the time she walked up, and she could feel the full brunt of his stare as she walked across the open ground to him. As she approached, he slid into the passenger seat and pulled out a bag of popcorn. After offering her a handful, he placed his feet on the dash and began to munch away contentedly.

“How is he?” Clint asked.

Natasha paused, “ _he’ll be fine”_ rising to the edge of her lips. While that was exactly what Pepper wanted to hear - it was brief, and got Natasha out of the room to let them reconcile - it wasn’t what Clint would want from her.

Now that she thought about it, she wasn’t exactly sure _what_ Clint would want to hear.

“I left before we started the heart-to-hearts,” Natasha admitted. “Pepper was there and...”

“Ew, feelings?” Clint surmised. Natasha jerked the car onto the street with a little more force than she probably needed to use. Some of Clint’s popcorn went flying, and he made a noise of disappointment.

“I didn’t see _you_ in there,” Natasha felt obliged to point out.

Clint shuddered theatrically. “ _Ew,_ feelings,” he said forcefully, poking meaningfully at his eye.

“Thought I shouldn’t hit Stark back while he was down.”

“There’s no nobility in the spy game,” Natasha said flatly.

Clint shrugged. “I could have shot Vance on sight, you could have killed Tony rather than talk him down, Steve could have revealed the truth about what happened to Tony - hell, Bruce could have stayed to help those kids in Rio or wherever he was rather than risk getting tangled up in this mess.”

“All of those actions would have resulted in counterproductive outcomes.” Natasha drummed her fingers on the steering wheel as they stopped at a red light, and checked for cops. Seeing none, she veered into a right turn.

“They would’ve been the smart thing to do.”

She slammed the car to the stop, feeling a little bit of amusement as Clint’s popcorn went flying again. “You’re picking that up,” she said automatically, then continued to start at him. “Agent Barton, are you implying that we did the _noble_ thing?”

Clint shut his mouth. “Well, shit,” he said. “There goes our cold, killer reputation.”

“Except no one but us and the President, VP, and Secretary of State will ever know the truth,” she said lightly. “So, naturally…”

“That state secret will be all over Twitter by the end of this week. I might as well Tweet it myself, get some new followers out of it. Breaking Barton News! Latest, Stone Cold Widow saves country from former employers,” Clint finished.

“Breaking Barton News sounds terrible,” Natasha snorted, slowly starting to speed the car back up once again. Clint leaned down to start picking up the littered popcorn.

“So where to next, Stone Cold Widow?” he asked.

Natasha paused at the next stop sign, chewing on her lip and then smiling. “Well, you _do_ still owe me a pizza.”

“Man, this is what I get for saving the country,” Clint complained goodnaturedly. “I gotta pick up all the bills.”

She patted Barton on the cheek. “You bet you do.”


End file.
